The thief and its gameplay - Your feedback [Merged]

The thief and its gameplay - Your feedback [Merged]

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Posted by: Lori.6571

Lori.6571

I completely agree with a few of the above posters who say that the PvP nerfs have really hurt us in PvE (which is what I spend 99.9% of my time doing…PvP just isn’t my thing). The Dancing Dagger one was a very painful one in particular.

I really wish you’d find a way to fix Flanking Strike…I so want to play with a S/D build but having it be so unpredictable that it’s useless, then adding the Dancing Dagger nerf, and it’s pointless to use that combination.

One thing nobody has brought up yet in this thread (though it’s been posted about elsewhere in the past) is the underwater thief. At present the only thing a thief will (or should) consider doing is equip spear, mash the #5 button a few times, hit #3 to regen some initiative, and repeat. It’s the only way we can survive and do anything even remotely worthwhile. And when it comes to utility and elite skills underwater….do we actually have any that work and are worth using? (Yes, this is a bit of an exaggeration, but not much of one). The whole underwater thief skill set needs a rework/rebalance.

EDIT: and yes, as others above had posted, venoms and traps are pretty much useless so they could use some love too

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Posted by: shrewd.5319

shrewd.5319

Hello Mr. Developers, what is outlined in the following thread is all you need to know:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/We-would-like-answers-Please/first

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Posted by: Volrath.1473

Volrath.1473

2 Main Issues:

1) Culling
2) Can use Full zerker build and still have the same survivability and very little downside compared to other classes that have to spec for survivability (at the cost of dmg).

Sorry I have to disagree, despite what non thieves say, thieves DO sacrifice survivability when going glass canon, just as they lose quite a lot of dmg when specing for stealth control or “support” (yeah the thieve profession has very little support but there is something there).

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Posted by: Okamakiri.8746

Okamakiri.8746

Thieves are very squishy even when specced for survival. Currently this is balanced by our ability to stealth and do high damage. Continuous nerfs to our DPS without any compensation to our survivability will lead to the class being broken.

I don´t think that last sentence is true, pal. If we get nerfs in the terms of DPS and boosts in the term of Survivability, we won´t be Thieves anymore, we would be medium-armored-tanks, which doesn´t suit the Thief class at all imho.

The sentence is absolutely true. Whether we should end up in the state you describe is another story, and I agree with you that we shouldn’t. But if they’re dead set on continuing to nerf our damage because of whiners, then buffs to our survivability are most certainly necessary if the class is to remain viable. Survivability vs damage capability should be a relatively constant ratio for all classes.

Anyway, I don’t think this thread is meant to be a discussion between us, but a place for everyone to provide their own feedback to devs. You don’t have to agree with my feedback, but you most certainly can provide your own.

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Posted by: bettadenu.5483

bettadenu.5483

snip.

Was a decent post until you said stealth isn’t a survivability tool.

Actually I had a post twice the size, had to cut it down in half due to size limitation, I was going to continue on the stealth but had to cut something somewhere including my discussion about WvW and traits, stealth is a survival tool but not by definition otherwise they would have given us stealth skills that grant us protection or something. I and so does everyone else use it to survive, I know you are like wtf what is this guy saying but stealth was designed with stealth skills to attack, not with stealth skills to survive. So I had to tag it has not a survival tool by definition.

I do agree with you and everyone here that you use it to survive though Sorry for the confusion!

(edited by bettadenu.5483)

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Posted by: Edeor.9720

Edeor.9720

I played stealthers in all mmorpg (from Daoc to Guild Wars 2) and, in my opinion, the Thief Guild Wars 2 is one of the worst balanced class in the game, so powerful that is just boring.

The thief has the highest burst damage in the game, one of the highest sustained damage, an incredible ability to survive, and is really easy to use (with the elementalist I have to use 8 skills to make the damage of cloack and dagger + baskstap, and that’s why there are a lot of thief ). These features can not coexist in a single charater, is just absurd (in WorldvsWorldvsWorld I’am almost immortal).

At the beginning I liked this, but now I can say that I don’t enjoy killing enemies in a second, nor to be almost immortal. The great thing about the stealther in all the mmorpg is that, in most cases, they require a great ability to understand when to attack (otherwise you are just dead), but this is completely absent in Guild Wars 2, because there are endless escape routes thanks to the incredibile number of in combat stealth skills.

I do not think that the damage of the thief is too high (expect the damage of steal that is absurd), the problem is that the broken stealth allows you to use an unlimited number of opening during a fight, which is totaly silly (on Daoc I can make just one Perferate artery and vanish has 5 min. cooldown), and, even you are a noob, you can just stealth and tp.

In conclusion, I think the first thing to do is to renovate the stealth dynamic, eliminating the possibility of hiding during the fight (or at least reduce the in combat stealth skills to one with an high cd – like Daoc’s vanish), and giving a permanent stealth with movement speed reduced (50%)

Kareha Silverwind – mesmer of Clan McBenwick (Gunnar’s Hold)

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Posted by: Bloodgruve.6038

Bloodgruve.6038

First I would like to say thank you for looking at abilities differently in PvP than in PvE, smart decision.

I spend more time on average in PvE.
*P/P – I like how this feels like the single target ranged option. However I feel Unload needs a slight boost or the other abilities need a slight boost. This is basically an Unload spam build in most situations so beef up the damage slightly or make the other initiative options more appealing.
*Ricochet trait could use a buff to 20%-25% or more to make it a viable option.
*Pistol Whip- I would like to see the 15% reduction of Pistol Whip refunded in ‘PvE Only’
*Dancing Dagger – I would like to see the damage increased in PvE or reduced initiative.
*Flanking Strike – This really needs a fix, as others suggested maybe let it port you behind the target or something.

Very little time in PvP but a fair ammount in WvW so this is mostly directed to WvW.
*As stated already, the rendering issues play a big part in the misconception of thieves being overpowered. Fix this and actual class issues will come into view, no pun intended…
*S/D builds were hit hard by the Dancing Dagger, Tactical Strike daze (and CnD in pvp) nerfs. A fix to Flanking Strike could do wonders here.
*Backstab- Backstabing an experienced can be very challenging. I feel this setup will be balanced if the rendering issue is fixed. Backstab can be out played.
*Quickness/Haste – I think this ability is causing a lot of issues for PvP, could use a rework.

In general stealth seems to be a bit buggy lately.

TY for listening,
Blood~

“Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance”

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Posted by: Foehn.2489

Foehn.2489

I agree with the post earlier. As Thieves our steal should be more than a gap-closer/mug. I appreciate the current select of stolen abilities but I wish there were more ways I can interact with them (F1 to F4 maybe?). Otherwise feels like we are really just Assassins that has a steal.

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Posted by: Razios.6291

Razios.6291

I think our wepon sets need to be either condition damage or power but not hybrid at least all our wepons.i dont think we would mind 1 hybrid wepon but what we have now is just unused skills.as well as unused utilities and traits.

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Posted by: climhazzard.5897

climhazzard.5897

I’ve played a venom thief for wvw and pve quite a bit, my weapons of choice were pistol/dagger and shortbow. I had no idea dancing dagger was so OP that it deserved a 50% damage nerf. I’m not quite understanding really, maybe Arena Net could explain the logic behind various things they do when they release a patch.

Anyways, the reason I’m posting is this. My thief has always been a very underwhelming character for pve (now more than ever). My damage is underwhelming, my survivability is underwhelming (my gear is all mostly carrion and knights), and my group utility is underwhelming. If I spec for venom sharing which has very poor range my damage becomes even more underwhelming and my character becomes a big liability because I can’t even equip a stunbreaker or group stealth utility skill.

I’m not really complaining I’ve long since stopped playing my thief, the group I run dungeons with daily has benefited quite a bit from this decision. But I also wouldn’t mind if the character were a more viable choice for my play experience.

(edited by climhazzard.5897)

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Posted by: Jack of Tears.9458

Jack of Tears.9458

Stupid forum messed up so this didn’t get posted on the last page, so I’m repostin’ it here.

Initiative on it’s own is both a blessing and a curse, because Initiative is the resource and the skill is the result in PvE it’s mostly pressing the best skill on the bar and repeat that (Pistol Whip) it doesn’t involve any tactical decisions and therefor is boring and bland.

STEAL
Now this is something I have wanted to discuss for a while due to the recent nerfs. Why is Steal even our class special ability? Environmental weapons are a gamble in PvE which it never should be. In PvP I can use each stolen item to work for me in my adventage but still I feel it should be different.

Initiative: I think, like anything, ya get what ya put into it. If ya just spam the same skill all the time, then sure it’s boring … but if ya use it the way it was meant to be used – to stay mobile and switch attacks quickly, then it’s a heck of allot of fun. I don’t think ya can blame Initiative for people being lazy.

Steal: I use steal for a gap closer, for a buff, for a quick damage/poison, and on top of all that, for the nifty stuff it gives me. There isn’t a fight I don’t use steal … it was a game changer for me; but I know it’s got a lurve-hate relationship with players. The Thief wouldn’t be the same without Steal, and yeah ya could make it a Utility Skill, but then you wouldn’t get the benefits of traiting into it – which are totally worth it.


I’m sorry I stepped outta yer box, don’ worry, if
ya whine enough they’ll put me right back.

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Posted by: Jack of Tears.9458

Jack of Tears.9458

2 Main Issues:

1) Culling
2) Can use Full zerker build and still have the same survivability and very little downside compared to other classes that have to spec for survivability (at the cost of dmg).

Sorry I have to disagree, despite what non thieves say, thieves DO sacrifice survivability when going glass canon, just as they lose quite a lot of dmg when specing for stealth control or “support” (yeah the thieve profession has very little support but there is something there).

Yeah, I lost 6000 hit points when I went from P/P Stealth build to D/D Glass Cannon … you notice that.


I’m sorry I stepped outta yer box, don’ worry, if
ya whine enough they’ll put me right back.

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Posted by: Razios.6291

Razios.6291

2 Main Issues:

1) Culling
2) Can use Full zerker build and still have the same survivability and very little downside compared to other classes that have to spec for survivability (at the cost of dmg).

Sorry I have to disagree, despite what non thieves say, thieves DO sacrifice survivability when going glass canon, just as they lose quite a lot of dmg when specing for stealth control or “support” (yeah the thieve profession has very little support but there is something there).

Yeah, I lost 6000 hit points when I went from P/P Stealth build to D/D Glass Cannon … you notice that.

its the main reason i run condition damage in dungeons,if not 2 hits and your dead

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Posted by: Jack of Tears.9458

Jack of Tears.9458

In conclusion, I think the first thing to do is to renovate the stealth dynamic, eliminating the possibility of hiding during the fight (or at least reduce the in combat stealth skills to one with an high cd – like Daoc’s vanish), and giving a permanent stealth with movement speed reduced (50%)

How about let’s not take away the Thieves only combat utility outside of the Glass Canon build? If I’m playin’ a P/P Thief, I’m not doing enough damage fast enough ta kill things before they get ta me, (unless I’m only fighting one target, and that almost never happens at high level) so I need a combat stealth. Either that or my only option is the dizzying circle kite … yay! No, the way Stealth works in this game is fantastic, it works with yer skills and hugs you in combat. Give that up for one 5 second combat stealth with a 5 minute CD and permastealth? At this point I wouldn’t want a permastealth for Thieves in this game – it would feel just wrong – and I think most of the Thief players feel the same.


I’m sorry I stepped outta yer box, don’ worry, if
ya whine enough they’ll put me right back.

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Posted by: Symbiont.2168

Symbiont.2168

here is my chance to give feedback on “Hidden Thief” trait, which enabled the thief to stealth when they steal. however the thief will lose stealth as quickly, unless he choose to disable auto-attack. which i find is a loss/loss situation because auto-attack for the #1 skill is too convenient to pass on.

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Posted by: Carnifex.8924

Carnifex.8924

Thank you for starting this topic. Incoming list of thoughts.
Changes Going Forward:
Please stop nerfing damage without compensating the ability to do damage in other meaningful/fun ways. If burst was a problem, why design a class based around ambushing their targets? Even condition builds are bursty with its ability to stack a respectable amount of bleeds in a short time.
Stealth:
Thieves are being unfairly punished for culling issues. Stealth is NOT permanent. Restealthing eats cooldowns or initiative. Though we do not get knocked out of stealth, we are still vulnerable to damage and have a nice 3-second revealed debuff. Though initially skeptical, I like the short duration of stealth because of the risk involved.
Steal:
Steal can be fantastic when properly traited. It is more melee-oriented though. A shadowstep away as 2nd class ability would be welcomed. It would be useful for both melee (to avoid aoe) and ranged to create distance from melee. Have this 2nd ability put both Steal and this on cooldown.
Alternatively, please have the stolen weapon do some or all of the following:
-Not go on full cooldown when interrupted.
-Stored in F2 for later use. Stealing something new would replace this.
Traps:
Traps feel weak not because of its effect, but its inability to really control an area outside of 1 target. This may work in spvp, but its effects are diminished in WvWvW and dungeons. In dungeons, the vast majority of the fights are group fights. Traps will only affect the first target that trips it, which may or may not the one you wanted to control. Caltrops, as a trick, are far more effective because of its size and that it cripples the area for a set time. Consider redesigning traps (rangers as well) to resemble caltrops. Of course Ambush Trap and Shadow Trap are exempt from this.
Scorpion Wire:
I’m satisfied with the majority of the tricks category as being situationally useful based on encounter/build. Scorpion Wire ranged increase was sweet, but the pull is unreliable. I’m assuming its due to how low compared to the body that the wire is thrown from causing it to obstruct when used against keep walls. There’s also the randomly short range that the wire can pull when thrown against uneven terrains. Please try to fix this and consider increasing the projectile speed.
Stealth Skills:
I do not like that some Stealth and Dual Skills tend to not synergize with each other. Sneak Attack is condition + weak power, while Unload is all power. Backstab is power, while Death Blossom is condition + weak power. Consider either streamlining dagger/dagger to be all power and pistol/pistol be all condition or provide 2nd/alternative Stealth Skills.

Dual Skills:
Death Blossom – unless you’re considering making this more power oriented, then its fine as is.
Shadow Shot – remove the root/make the stab instant. Just think of a reverse Shadow Strike.
Unload – expensive and weak even if it is a ranged attack. Consider lowering the initiative cost or making it more like Sneak Attack (with say a bleed on every other hit to balance).
Shadow Strike – fine as is.
Flanking Strike – is unreliable and locks down the movement in an awkward way. Death Blossom feels right in the way it moves and locks you into the jump in comparison. Consider making this into a parry-type skill or a melee-shadowstep that puts the thief behind the target.
Pistol Whip – with Anet’s acceptance of splitting pve and pvp numbers, please return the -15% nerf to Pistol Whip for PVE. It is expensive and locks you in place. Currently, it does about as much damage as the auto-attack and you can mimic the effect with Black Powder and auto-attack.
Elite Skills:
Lack of Underwater Options – please either let Dagger Storm and Thieves Guild to be used underwater or improve Basilisk Venom’s effect to be more attractive.
Basilisk Venom – the stun is nice, but it seems more appropriate as a skill rather than an elite. Outside of a gimmicky build that takes advantage of Runes that proc off Elite skills, this is just simply underwhelming.
Traits:
Overall – Deadly Arts and Shadow Arts are designed the best in both theme and function.
Improvisation – too random. It’d be better if it picked a skill family from what you have equipped.
Sundering Strikes – remove the 1-sec cooldown. Control the total effect by its duration instead.
Venomous Aura – increase the range and maybe fold Residual Venoms’ effect into this.
Ricochet – one of the worst traits for thief. This trait can go a long way in improving pistol/pistol builds. Instead of the warrior rifle trait that makes bullet pierce, make it a 100% chance to bounce to 1 target.

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Posted by: Jack of Tears.9458

Jack of Tears.9458

its the main reason i run condition damage in dungeons,if not 2 hits and your dead

Mostly, yeah. I did manage, though, I did manage ta run a Glass Cannon build through a dungeon and kick tail; died less than anyone else and was usually the one what was doing the resing in hard fights on top of it. (yes, running GC with Shadow Refuge just in case … good combo)


I’m sorry I stepped outta yer box, don’ worry, if
ya whine enough they’ll put me right back.

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Posted by: WhimsicalPacifist.2943

WhimsicalPacifist.2943

Thief already has all the tools it needs for survival via Shortbow for positioning, built in evades on multiple weaponsets and very strong options in Shadow Arts/Acrobatic. The single best passive condition removal in the game is available to thieves as a 10-point trait in Shadow Arts. Were thief to get a buff to survivability P/D, the Leaping Unicorn, and S/P would be over the top.

What Anet should focus on are:

1. Taking another look at the underwater weaponset to ensure that condition thieves aren’t penalized by getting wet.
2. Creating interesting counterplay to the mechanics of stealth/high damage. Maybe change some of the reflect effects to reflect melee damage.

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Posted by: Hanzo.9624

Hanzo.9624

The problem with allowing players to jump into pvp from level 2 is that you have a lot of people with little to no experience crying about other classes being overpowered. There has not been ONE post from a tournament perspective about thieves being overpowered, only underpowered. Don’t take anything casual whiners say seriously. There will always be those people who would rather see opposition made weaker in lieu of becoming better players.

That being said, it feels like thieves have entered a grey area where we’ll eventually be mediocre in all areas. Double dagger backstab is fun and effective but we die almost instantly when focused which is appropriate, but nerfing our damage is going to render that build unusable as there’s just an unfair trade off between damage and survivabilty.

Pistol/dagger is an effective but fairly boring build for pvp. It’s hitting 1 and then using cloak and dagger to open with bleeds. The number 2 ability for stacking vulnerability seems out of place as it doesn’t help with our bleed damage. I think the dual skill should do more damage as well.

Sword/anything needs help. Pistol whip is trash without haste and signet of precision to refill endurance so that’s two mandatory utilities to use a subpar skill that roots us. Hundred Blades and haste drops me (toughness stacked with over 20k hp) almost instantly without a stun break, so what was the problem with pistol whip?

Pistol/pistol would be better if Unload did more damage and had something else like stacking three bleeds ala Death Blossom. That way it would fit more in line with the bleed stacking pistol builds. Right now we pretty much need to use Shortbow with any build just for mobility it’d be nice to use our other ranged option.

Right now if we go burst we die immediately. If we even remotely focus on training for defense our damage drop is ridiculous. Our bleed damage is subpar. People can still channel abilities on us through stealth which makes our primary defensive mechanism unreliable. Thieves Guild cool down is too long. We need to have our DPS looked at because right now it’s do burst but die or survive but have trouble killing anything. I would also love to see venoms become viable options for us.

Also basilisk venom being our only underwater elite is absurd. All three of our elites could work underwater. Basilisk venom and all the venoms are undesirable only because of how unreliable they are to use. Any number of things can make you waste venoms. If you shoot air with basilisk venom on, you waste it. That’s dumb. Give us a better chance at actually applying them. Maybe an opposite venom share option where the venoms you apply to one target can be spread to other enemies. I’d like to see poisons stack so we can build condition thieves with bleeds and poisons and be more effective without having to go full power crit builds.

(edited by Hanzo.9624)

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Posted by: Lunaire.5827

Lunaire.5827

Speaking in SPvP:

I feel that our damage output can be too much if speced for glass cannon.

Alternatively, I feel our survivability is very poor, particularly if not speced as a glass cannon thief. Glass cannon thiefs can kill people near-instantly, allowing them to stealth out and get away.

However, specing a thief as a tanky thief does not seem to give very good results, encouraging more glass cannons as that is really the only thing that we excel at.

Also, I personally play a condition thief because I don’t like being a glass cannon…. however, my survivability is terrible, and you need great survivability to be a condition build because it is not instant damage.

I feel that this could be supplemented by adding an amulet with cond, +vit,toughness ….. as it stands right now, the closest is Carrion which is +cond, +power, +vit — when condition builds do not really need power all that much.

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Posted by: Einlanzer.1627

Einlanzer.1627

I think our wepon sets need to be either condition damage or power but not hybrid at least all our wepons.i dont think we would mind 1 hybrid wepon but what we have now is just unused skills.as well as unused utilities and traits.

I disagree with this. I enjoy that you aren’t forced into using one specific weapon for whatever build you have. I don’t want to be restricted even more than we already are.

(edited by Einlanzer.1627)

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Posted by: Razios.6291

Razios.6291

I think our wepon sets need to be either condition damage or power but not hybrid at least all our wepons.i dont think we would mind 1 hybrid wepon but what we have now is just unused skills.as well as unused utilities and traits.

I disagree with this. I don’t want to be restricted even more than we already are.

so youd rather have skills useless no matter what you go and continue to spam 2 skills, okay then.

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Posted by: Einlanzer.1627

Einlanzer.1627

I think our wepon sets need to be either condition damage or power but not hybrid at least all our wepons.i dont think we would mind 1 hybrid wepon but what we have now is just unused skills.as well as unused utilities and traits.

I disagree with this. I don’t want to be restricted even more than we already are.

so youd rather have skills useless no matter what you go and continue to spam 2 skills, okay then.

Except they aren’t useless. As it is, I can benefit from both power and condition damage whether using Pistols or Daggers. I like it that way.

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Posted by: bettadenu.5483

bettadenu.5483

Stupid forum messed up so this didn’t get posted on the last page, so I’m repostin’ it here.

Initiative on it’s own is both a blessing and a curse, because Initiative is the resource and the skill is the result in PvE it’s mostly pressing the best skill on the bar and repeat that (Pistol Whip) it doesn’t involve any tactical decisions and therefor is boring and bland.

STEAL
Now this is something I have wanted to discuss for a while due to the recent nerfs. Why is Steal even our class special ability? Environmental weapons are a gamble in PvE which it never should be. In PvP I can use each stolen item to work for me in my adventage but still I feel it should be different.

Initiative: I think, like anything, ya get what ya put into it. If ya just spam the same skill all the time, then sure it’s boring … but if ya use it the way it was meant to be used – to stay mobile and switch attacks quickly, then it’s a heck of allot of fun. I don’t think ya can blame Initiative for people being lazy.

Steal: I use steal for a gap closer, for a buff, for a quick damage/poison, and on top of all that, for the nifty stuff it gives me. There isn’t a fight I don’t use steal … it was a game changer for me; but I know it’s got a lurve-hate relationship with players. The Thief wouldn’t be the same without Steal, and yeah ya could make it a Utility Skill, but then you wouldn’t get the benefits of traiting into it – which are totally worth it.

I’m so glad you said this regarding Steal, it’s exactly the point with steal, traits make it incredibly useful but it doesn’t affect the environmental weapons themself which what the main concept of steal is. Everything else is a secondary effect (Gap closer)

If you take plain steal without traiting what do you end up with? A gap closer with an environmental weapon generation on a cooldown.

This is exactly the point what im trying to make with converting steal to a utility and implement a new special class ability because steal itself only becomes very nifty when traited for it, other classes have a strong concept on what their respective class does. i.e. Guardian virtues you know what it does and you activate them for their respective plain secondary effect, you can trait them to become better. but our traits do not affect the primary steal effect (generating an environmental weapon) instead they add secondary effects without enhancing the primary. Therefor my strong suggestion to make it a utility.

Plus it would nerf the ridiculous Backstab build, I play it from time to time but I just feel silly :P

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Posted by: Razios.6291

Razios.6291

I think our wepon sets need to be either condition damage or power but not hybrid at least all our wepons.i dont think we would mind 1 hybrid wepon but what we have now is just unused skills.as well as unused utilities and traits.

I disagree with this. I don’t want to be restricted even more than we already are.

so youd rather have skills useless no matter what you go and continue to spam 2 skills, okay then.

Except they aren’t useless. As it is, I can benefit from both power and condition damage whether using Pistols or Daggers. I like it that way.

you can but overall your not gonna have both power and condition damage at least enough to matter.and power isnt that strong its the crit % and crit dmg that really does the dmg from power builds your bleeding does 5% of your condtion dmg.

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Posted by: Einlanzer.1627

Einlanzer.1627

Stealth is just all around buggy. It should work as a full aggro dump in PvE but it often doesn’t. It’s extremely common that I’ll use it to drop aggro, and whatever mob was attacking me goes right back to attacking me when I reappear even if they are taking damage from another source.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Stealth not working like it’s intended to was the main reason low level thieves have so many issues.

(edited by Einlanzer.1627)

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Posted by: Symbiont.2168

Symbiont.2168

some of our dual skills seems lackluster; shadow shot and shadow strike.
unload is too easily dodged, my suggestion is to make the initial shot do the most damage.

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Posted by: DanH.5879

DanH.5879

+1 to the op that opened the thread, finally someone who cares !

1. flanking strike – lol vs a moving target … i need not to say more
2. traps are lol – just not enough reason to use them (most), they should persist for a few seconds (1-2) on the ground, affecting more than 1 enemy (2-3), note that the effects can’t be triggered at your own will as other skills….
3. same with vennoms without the sharing aura: imo kill the aura, lower recherge of vennoms
4. dancing dagger is not really balanced, too much init cost (lower targets from 4 to 3 if needed)
5.+1 second to stealth from trait still not affects the shadow trap
6. you have 1 target and you need to use bow via autoattack … it sux
i would gladly accept 2.5x damage at 1200 range, than the current setup
or make it that if the arrow doesn’t bounce, to hit the same target… same to dancing daggers, and you can keep your 50% nerf.
7. roll for initiative for 60 sec recharge is too much, reduce to 30 sec and put 3 ini instead of 6 (60 sec for a break stun?, no 10×...)
8. and then you can nerf backstab builds if you so wish….

the thing that needs to be for a player (utility skills): i want this skill, and this, and this,and this, but that one is also so good, i can’t choose !
current situation:this one sux, the other sux even harder, this is not related to my build, this is also not related etc.

(edited by DanH.5879)

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Posted by: bettadenu.5483

bettadenu.5483

+1 to the op that opened the thread, finally someone who cares !

Yes i’m so glad that we finally get some attention! To be honest I was starting to feel left out as a Thief, good to see someone caring about our profession.

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Posted by: Stiv.1820

Stiv.1820

+1 to the op that opened the thread, finally someone who cares !

Yes i’m so glad that we finally get some attention! To be honest I was starting to feel left out as a Thief, good to see someone caring about our profession.

You guys realize this is the thread they are pointing everyone to who is calling for Thief nerfs right? This is the new dumping ground for all Thief QQ.

I guess it’s a good thing since the WvW forums are just full of level 30s getting 3 shot by thieves and complaining they are OP, stealth = invulnerability and there is no way to stop a stealth stomp.

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Posted by: bettadenu.5483

bettadenu.5483

^Maybe, but if ArenaNet doesn’t realize that there are structural problems with the class that everyone is complaining about aside from top single target damage then I have no hope for future balancing regardless of profession.

Like I said in my screenshot, it doesn’t matter what they hand us in patches we will find ways to make people complain. It’s the innate creativity of every dedicated Thief player that cannot be nerfed, so we will always be OP in a sense.

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Posted by: Overmind.3705

Overmind.3705

Thieves are completely unbalanced because a well played thief can go 1v4 and consistently win. Why? Stealth. Stealth is basically 100% immunity if played correctly.

Up-time on stealth + evades = 100% immunity.

Yes, thieves can still be hit by aoe. But aoe is either short range like a sword swing or ground placement which includes a red do-not-stand-here circle. Both are easily avoided but extremely hard to place and normally have too long a cooldown for random “I hope he’s there” spam.

Ranged based characters have nothing that can hit a thief. Target is lost every time they stealth. Reacquiring a target to even fire again requires you to find them and click on them, or a tab press that finds a target… which in either case is likely NOT the thief. You cannot even shoot blind and hope you hit. For some crazy reason if you shoot without a target you automatically shoot 2ft into the ground in front of you. That’s not where the thief is going to be.

A thief can use stealth to drop combat, heal to full automatically, then reengage before their target can drop combat. Even allowing for a brand new weapon to be equipped that’s perfect vs that target. So it’s a free reset for the thief but not for their target.

A thief can do damage and stay stealthed. If the thief does this properly the target will not realize where the damage is coming from until it’s too late. You can never really know if you are being killed by a stealthed thief or just by an unrendered source. So you cannot simply think “I’m taking damage must be a thief” and respond accordingly because if it’s just the clipping bug then you are equally screwed. (But if you are dead in under 2sec… ya it was a thief.)

You cannot run away from a thief. It is impossible. The only thing you can hope for is that the thief doesn’t follow you for some reason. They can engage combat at the farthest range by a very large margin. They out-range and out run everything with proper use of shadowstep + other skills.

Abilities like Dancing Dagger even provide immunity. DD reflects range damage. The thief takes none of it, the source takes all of it. That’s not how Retaliation works. Dancing Dagger’s is far better. And that doesn’t show up the thief’s buffs when you look at them. The only way you find out that the spinning animation is causing you to kill yourself is either by playing a thief yourself, or by checking the combat log and then looking up the spell. It should not be necessary to look up that info when it could be displayed as a boon. (Not like you’d have time to read it but at least it’s there.)

Rangers are hard countered by Thieves. They literally have nothing that they can do against them. A ranger can design a build specifically to counter thieves and then the ranger has a chance against a mediocre thief… but not unless they do exactly that. I checked online for videos and info on rangers vs thieves. There isn’t even one youtube video where the ranger wins. (Excluding videos where the thief is totally incompetent and never stealths.)

I agree with others here about certain other skills being overpowered. Anything that kills another player in under 2 seconds is not balanced and not fun. I don’t care if the target has no defensive stats. If they are at full hp it should not be possible to die/kill that fast.

Obviously thieves should get stealth. And obviously nobody wants the clipping issue. I haven’t suggested any ways to fix this because I don’t know how to do that without unfairly destroying the class. But the first thing that should happen to all classes is that if you do not have a target you automatically fire to max range along the plane of the ground. Anything else is ridiculous as it means you simply cannot hit a target that is strafe running regardless of if they are stealthed or not. (Because you can’t lead the target otherwise.) Maybe let players see damage numbers on screen vs stealthed targets? idk.

I strongly encourage developers to google and find random videos of Thieves vs whatever. Or whatever vs Thieves. See what good players are doing vs thieves and good thieves are doing vs other players. A good thief can literally take on 4 others and win. You cannot damage something you cannot target.

(edited by Overmind.3705)

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Posted by: Rayya.2591

Rayya.2591

My suggestion list :
skills :
wild strike – add an aoe effect
lotus strike – increase poison to 3.5 seconds
shadow’s refuge – decrease stealth time to 7 seconds
dancing dagger – increase damage by 20%
cloack and dagger – remove stealth and add 5 seconds protection or furry
vennom’s : make stacks to remain if you miss target
deception skills : give us some for underwater combat

Traits :
mug – reduce damage by 30%
Keen observer – this trait promote glas cannon build , other build will never have full health
First strikes – this trait look weak for 25 points on critical strikes, most of the times you will not have over 6 initiative
Hidden Killer – is an bit overpowered in current state
Sundering strikes – this trait could use an buff to compete with mug
Improvisation – this trait should focus on 1 type of skills
Residual vennom – looks weak for 30 points
Uncatchable – could have an 10 seconds cooldown

http://imgur.com/a/fKgjD
no.1 WvW kills

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Posted by: Overmind.3705

Overmind.3705

To Thief players…
Name one other profession that can kill a player in under 2 seconds.

Certain thief skills may need buffing/reworking but that doesn’t negate the fact that there is an overpower problem where thieves are concerned.

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Posted by: Rayya.2591

Rayya.2591

A thief can use stealth to drop combat, heal to full automatically, then reengage before their target can drop combat. So it’s a free reset for the thief but not for their target.
A thief can do damage and stay stealthed. If the thief does this properly the target will not realize where the damage is coming from until it’s too late. You can never really know if you are being killed by a stealthed thief or just by an unrendered source. So you cannot simply think “I’m taking damage must be a thief” and respond accordingly because if it’s just the clipping bug then you are equally screwed. (But if you are dead in under 2sec… ya it was a thief.)
You cannot run away from a thief. It is impossible. The only thing you can hope for is that the thief doesn’t follow you for some reason. They can engage combat at the farthest range by a very large margin. They out-range and out run everything with proper use of shadowstep + other skills.
Abilities like Dancing Dagger even provide immunity. DD reflects range damage. The thief takes none of it, the source takes all of it. That’s not how Retaliation works. Dancing Dagger’s is far better. And that doesn’t show up the thief’s buffs when you look at them. The only way you find out that the spinning animation is causing you to kill yourself is either by playing a thief yourself, or by checking the combat log and then looking up the spell. It should not be necessary to look up that info when it could be displayed as a boon. (Not like you’d have time to read it but at least it’s there.)

Rangers are hard countered by Thieves. They literally have nothing that they can do against them. A ranger can design a build specifically to counter thieves and then the ranger has a chance against a mediocre thief… but not unless they do exactly that. I checked online for videos and info on rangers vs thieves. There isn’t even one youtube video where the ranger wins. (Excluding videos where the thief is totally incompetent and never stealths.)

I agree with others here about certain other skills being overpowered. Anything that kills another player in under 2 seconds is not balanced and not fun. I don’t care if the target has no defensive stats. If they are at full hp it should not be possible to die/kill that fast.

Obviously thieves should get stealth. And obviously nobody wants the clipping issue. I haven’t suggested any ways to fix this because I don’t know how to do that without unfairly destroying the class. But the first thing that should happen to all classes is that if you do not have a target you automatically fire to max range along the plane of the ground. Anything else is ridiculous as it means you simply cannot hit a target that is strafe running regardless of if they are stealthed or not. (Because you can’t lead the target otherwise.) Maybe let players see damage numbers on screen vs stealthed targets? idk.

I strongly encourage developers to google and find random videos of Thieves vs whatever. Or whatever vs Thieves. See what good players are doing vs thieves and good thieves are doing vs other players. A good thief can literally take on 4 others and win. You cannot damage something you cannot target.

In order to full heal , an thief must go out that 2000 range / that would reset combat for both
If an thief in stealth state will do any damage, he get an debuf "reveal " he cannot stealth for next 3 seconds"
Thiefs will catch most of the classes, but elementarists can outrun them
I have to agree that thief is an nightmare for ranger , i haven’t lost to an ranger yet, but an ranger combined with guardian will kill 2 vs 2 – 2 thieves. As well they got some build that can put thieves in trouble with 2 knockbacks and chill …
Dagger storm is an antiranged skill , if you use it vs an GS warrior he will kill you in 2 seconds, or vs another thief. Guardians will ignore it. Is strong vs mesmers and rangers only

http://imgur.com/a/fKgjD
no.1 WvW kills

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Posted by: DanH.5879

DanH.5879

please make sticky.

to the post below: omg omg 15 k dmg…nerf BS …oh wait, it is a warrior at 1200+ range..nevermind…

(edited by DanH.5879)

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Posted by: Imperator totius Sylvari.9164

Imperator totius Sylvari.9164

To Thief players…
Name one other profession that can kill a player in under 2 seconds.

Certain thief skills may need buffing/reworking but that doesn’t negate the fact that there is an overpower problem where thieves are concerned.

Quite a few can kill glass cannons rather quickly and less then 2 seconds

Attachments:

Founder of [CBA]/Former vE
No.2 Warrior NA/Irl behind Mr Kitten.7359

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Posted by: Tulisin.6945

Tulisin.6945

First of all, let me thank you for taking the initiative to open this line of communication. I know how difficult it is to sort through player feedback but the community really does appreciate the opportunity to give their input.

The main point I’d like to raise is that the round of nerfs in the last patch seemed to accomplish the exact opposite of what we were told the stated intent was going to be. While the burst closer->backstab combos capable of ending fights in a few seconds were nearly untouched, nerfs to the dagger off-hand skills had disastrous effects on other viable weapon combinations. By nerfing thief control and access to damage outside of D/D, thieves were just pushed more towards ending fights swiftly with D/D burst builds. While there’s a place for this “assassin” playstyle, I think everyone can agree that more build diversity is better. GW2 has done exceptionally well so far at defying traditional RPG stereotypes by allowing each profession to be built in a variety of ways. I’d had to see hearty duelist thieves, support thieves, gunslingers, etc all go by the wayside in favor of a single playstyle.

That aside, I’d like to give individual feedback on a per-skill basis so you can get a general idea of where I, personally, feel the strengths of thieves lie, where they could be improved, and how players are actually utilizing these skills in real settings instead of on-paper.

From the top:
Steal – There’s a lot of debate about this profession mechanic, ranging from accusations that it is dull to it being completely useless. Steal isn’t as interesting as some other profession mechanics but I believe it is powerful enough, especially with the multitude of trait mechanics to enhance it and the fact that it isn’t our sole profession mechanic (it is paired with initiative). The are two improvements I’d really like to see for the Steal mechanic. Firstly, Steal is unfriendly to thieves that don’t want to be in melee range. Steal is useful as a closer, but it is a forced closer. A simple F2 option to do a ranged steal with no closing mechanic would suffice to remedy this (same cooldown). The other thing I’d like to see regarding Steal is some more skill synergy. Trait synergy with Steal is excellent, but a utility skill or two that worked together with it would move it from an add-on for all builds to something a thief could really focus on. Perhaps traps could reduce Steal cooldown when triggered?

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Posted by: Tulisin.6945

Tulisin.6945

-Short Bow-
You’ll find SB as a whole one of thief’s most powerful and balanced weapon sets. Plenty of room for synergy, plenty of room to get better with mastery, utility, mobility, raw damage (both condition and power-based, depending), AE capability. This weapon brings everything to the table but in such a way that few thieves consider it a viable main weapon, but nearly every thief will have it on swap. In short, this is the gold standard for thief weapons, one that nearly everyone considers amazing but nearly no one complains is overpowered.

1. Trick Shot – An excellent example of an auto attack. Weak against a single target, but powerful in multi-target situations. This creates a dynamic skill that has a place without being a solution to all situations. Due to shortbow’s inability to enter stealth organically (no SB skills cause stealth on their own without outside help), Surprise Shot is rarely used. Surprise Shot functions as a solid stealth attack though, with useful utility (decent-length immobilize) that can be synergized with traits/skills. If SB gained organic stealth, there would likely be complaints about Surprise Shot’s damage, but as it stands people are generally happy.

2. Cluster Bomb – This is an incredible ability, probably the most versatile thieves have. It is thieves’ only viable 1200 range damage skill, thieves’ only burst damage 5-target AE skill, and one of the only ways to spam blast finishers in the game. Depending on how this skill is used it can deliver incredible power-based damage, powerful group utility, or heavy condition damage via bleeds. However, it should be noted that most thieves understand the true damage potential of this skill can only be realized at point-blank range due to a slow flight time and the fact that only one cluster bomb can be in the air at any period. This means in practice this skill operates far more often as a melee skill than the on-paper numbers would suggest. Excellent skill overall, as is to be expected from a SB skill.

3. Disabling Shot – Not a damage skill, unlike the first two, but still holds a special place for on-demand utility and on-demand evade. A solid skill with a single complaint: The backwards evade forces a particular playstyle wherein the player is trying to create range. Many times, thieves are trying to close with the shortbow, due to the aforementioned effectiveness of Cluster Bomb as a shotgun effect. This skill seems designed to create range, which makes it rather useless when attempting to give chase (a role that thieves often fill). While that doesn’t necessarily make it a bad skill, it is an example of strict design narrowing down effective playstyles. Being able to chase with Disabling Shot wouldn’t break anything, but due to preconceived notions of how a shortbow “should be used”, the skill doesn’t function well in many situations. Getting away from this design philosophy is how build diversity will flourish and players will be able to bend weapons to their play styles instead of vice versa.

4. Choking Gas – Excellent utility skill, and thieves’ only weapon skill that creates a damaging AE field, which allows a lot of synergy with on-hit effects and the like. Only suggestion I would have would be to have Choking Gas join Cluster Bomb at 1200 range to give thieves a larger wealth of control/utility options at that range.

5. Infiltrator’s Arrow – If SB is the gold standard in weapons, IA is the gold standard in weapon skills. It has in-combat applications as well as non-combat applications. IA has a low skill floor, it is easy to use effectively, anyone can pick it up and gain a good amount of mobility, blind-on-demand, etc. However, IA also has a high skill cap, there’s a lot of room to master the skill, and its uses grow with the player. More skills should be like this.

-Sword-
I really want to like sword, and it definitely has its place, but continual lack of support for the sword-based weapon sets on behalf of ANet makes them less and less viable every patch. Even when sword skills themselves don’t change when changes are made to /D and /P offhand skills that affect the sword sets differently than other sets, sword suffers. Ideally I see sword as a power-based weapon that trades the direct burst damage of a dagger or the range/utility capability of pistol for control and AE capability. Sword also has the perhaps unintentional attribute of being a low-initiative weapon set. Due to there being nothing worth spending initiative on damage-wise sword weapon sets tend to rely on auto attack and use their initiative pool reactively instead of proactively. This isn’t necessarily bad, but makes sword play out much differently from other sets. I’d love to hear from the developers on what their design philosophy is concerning each weapon.

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Posted by: Tulisin.6945

Tulisin.6945

1. Slice->Slash->Crippling Strike – No one can argue that this auto attack chain isn’t powerful, it hits three targets, causes two conditions, and does solid DPS. The main problem with the strength of this auto attack is the weakness of every other skill that a mainhand sword can access meaning that auto attack is, bar none, the best DPS choice of any thief running a sword mainhand. Yes, that means sword auto attack is better than anything S/D or S/P has to offer in a damage sense, in every situation. Auto attack is also heavily back-loaded with most of the damage and conditions on the third strike. Moving cripple or weakness to the second strike of the chain would even out the effects a bit more and make early cancelling the chain more viable (change names accordingly). Tactical Strike, the stealthed version of sword auto attack, is quite malleable and useful, although it suffered in the most recent patch for PvP purposes. Increasing the damage element of TS while lowering the control element was a poor choice that tried to make TS more like dagger’s backstab and worked against build diversity instead of towards it.

2. Infiltrator’s Strike – Awesome skill, fits with the rest of the sword set very well. Another skill that is simple to use but benefits heavily from mastery. Spammable condition removal is unique to this skill for thieves, and it offers both control and mobility.

3. S/D – Flanking Strike – Easily the most controversial sword skill. Flanking Strike looks great on paper, solid damage, an evade, even boon removal. However, this skill is utterly crippled by poor pathing on the animation itself. A quick initial strike, then an odd spin to the side of the enemy while evading, followed by a brief period where full control of your character is regained (any actions during this period can terminate the skill early and cause the bulk of the damage to be lost), and then a final strike. I’d like to say this makes the skill potent in the hands of a master able to manipulate all these factors and come out on top, but in practice it just makes FS clunky and weak. Tearing control of your character from you for that long while also having a movement effect is disastrous in anything but very stationary NPCs. This skill was too ambitious, trying to bundle too many things (large damage, evade, shift into the rear arc, boon removal) into one skill, and as a result is a very poor choice in the vast majority of situations. I believe the design of this skill was meant to support quickly shifting to the back arc, but I don’t think the developers realize how little thieves can actually benefit from that. The only things that benefit from being in the back arc are a couple traits which the thief may or may not have, and from-stealth melee attacks, and you can’t follow FS with a from-stealth melee attack because it is so slow. There is no time to get behind someone, stealth, and execute an attack when they’ve usually already turned around in the eternity it takes to execute an FS. In short, there’s no real reason to invest so much into “flanking”, and it doesn’t work anyways. In conclusion: bad evade skill, bad positioning skill, bad damage skill. That leaves its only real role as a boon removal skill, and only because it is the only one thieves get. I’d much rather just pay 4 initiative for a one-strike boon removal skill than go through all the hassle of FS. That said, my suggestion would be to get rid of the fanciful movement and dual-strike nature, frontload everything onto that initial strike and simply shadowstep the thief behind their target (along with a 180 degree facing). No evade, but no eternity of animation either. Consider also making this skill a leap or whirl finisher to give thieves more access to combos.

S/P – Pistol Whip – Another controversial skill. Honestly, it has a decent amount going for it between being a reliable evade (it isn’t the full animation, but you can time it to get proper use out of it), an interrupt, and high hit volume (lots of hits = more chances to proc things). The major weakness of PW is that it does less DPS than auto attack while eating a bunch of initiative. This was not previously the case before the 15 % nerf, but I don’t believe reversing the nerf to be an ideal solution either. Instead, I’d like to see build diversity promoted a bit by giving PW a short (2/3 second) Burn application upon the initial shot. This gives thieves access to the burn condition, boosts PW’s damage in a non-power based manner, and creates a bit of condition synergy when using S/P. It also means the initial reason PW was nerfed, Quickness combos allowing a bunch of PWs to be executed in a couple seconds, won’t be as potent due to damage being less frontloaded because of Burning’s duration-stacking nature.

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Posted by: Tulisin.6945

Tulisin.6945

-Dagger-
Dagger is usually either played as a high-power bursty setup or a high-condition AE setup, and I feel this is a success on a design level. This weapon set is malleable and intricate, offering thieves’ only leap finisher. It is quite a shame that so many thieves don’t try to use it to its full potential due to some rather direct applications of skills.

1. Double Strike -> Wild Strike -> Lotus Strike – A solid auto attack chain that makes each strike in the chain unique and useful (in contrast to the back-loading in sword). Double Strike has hit volume going for it, Wild Strike grants endurance, the only weapon skill that does, and Lotus Strike applies poison giving this power-based attack some condition synergy. No complaints here, this is how auto attack chains should work.

Backstab – Deserves its own bolded point. Backstab is a problem. Why is BS a problem? It isn’t because it is too powerful. No, it is because BS is bland and poorly synergized. Daggers have a lot going for them, solid mobility, poison-on-auto, stealth, endurance-on-auto. Notice that the sword stealth attack offers different effects depending on positioning. What does BS offer? Huge direct damage, or less huge direct damage. Now, the balance point for this is supposed to be positioning challenge of stealthing and getting behind an opponent, which is largely negated by a number of thief closer tactics. This breaks the risk/reward equation for the skill by removing much of the positioning difficulty. The end result is that this boring ability is incredibly popular for ending fights quickly. You know what the best way to stop this is? The correct answer is not “reduce the damage by some percent”. No the correct answer is “reduce the direct damage by some percent and make backstab less boring by giving it more attributes to synergize with”. My suggestion? Take a leaf out of auto attack’s book and make back stab steal endurance. Now you’ve still got a positoning-based ability that is powerful, but it follows an established theme in dagger skills, synergizes with the thief Acrobatics line, and is uniquely painful in PvP (reducing an enemy’s mobility in a way no other skill does) without being a boring instakill solution. No more one-hit-wonder combos, no more incredibly low skill floor on using thieves competitively.

2. Heartseeker – This skill was a problem early on but has actually evolved quite well after the initial nerf. It it similar to shortbow’s IA in that it has in-combat applications as well as out-of-combat applications (leap finisher, movement). Also similar to IA it is incredibly easy to use for a newbie to pick up and use, but gets a lot better with skill. Good overall, again because the skill has multiple attributes to synergize with (leap finisher, direct movement ability, execution-type damage, closer).

3. D/D – Death Blossom – This is a love-it-or-hate it skill for most of the community. The problem many perceive is that its condition nature doesn’t “fit” with most of the other power-based dagger skills. However, I see this as a sign of good design making the weapon set malleable. DB’s evade and AE components mean even non-condition-heavy thieves will find it useful.

D/P – Shadow Shot – This weapon combo is extremely rare so this skill doesn’t see much play time. The main problem is that this is an obvious closer skill that completely fails to close if the pistol shot doesn’t connect, leaving the D/P thief at a useless range with little initiative.

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Posted by: Rottaran Owain.6789

Rottaran Owain.6789

The largest issue we have right now is culling, and channeling skills tracking us through stealth.

Its not to say that we don’t have other problems though.

Traps are for the most part useless. Tripwire, and spike trap, even if they were useful, are way too similar in use. There’s a lack of ability to trait towards trapping. Only thing that I recall us being able to do is decrease the cooldown by 20%.

Our build diversity is heavily limited. This is in part due to the thief’s mechanics making switching weapons in combat rarely a good idea, excluding the shortbow with its shadowsteps for escape. As a result, every thief build ends up incorporating the shortbow in some way.

Venoms are not only weak, but uninteresting to play with.

Case in point, skale venom is entirely pointless to anyone who has 15 points into Deadly Arts, and mostly useless to everyone else.

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Posted by: Tulisin.6945

Tulisin.6945

4. Dancing Dagger – Oh boy, what a skill, this one has caused a lot of debate on these forums these past couple weeks since the nerf. Dancing Dagger means vastly different things to different weapon sets. This means that the severity and intent of the nerfs vary wildly depending on the preferences of the thief you talk to. DD was reduced in damage by 50 % with absolutely no other adjustments, leaving it as a low/middle damage skill, relatively expensive in terms of initiative, and having some utility via ranged cripple. The problem with this is that DD doesn’t fill a universal role in each weapon set, the same skill is used for different things depending on the pairing, and changes made to affect one set have hugely affected other sets, IMO, an unintentional manner. So let me break down DD by x/D combo.

D/D – This weapon combo doesn’t lack for burst power-based damage, but does need to attain melee range to deliver its most potent attacks. DD is an excellent chasing solution with the cripple slowing down an opponent enough to close range and do burst damage. Pre-nerf and post-nerf the change to Dancing Dagger is not very drastic for D/D.

S/D – Pre-nerf DD was the primary burst skill of this set. Let me repeat that, Dancing Dagger is how S/D did burst damage. I already outlined that FS is a poor damage skill. S/D doesn’t lack closers, it has Infiltrator’s Strike, what it lacks is a way to pour initiative into damage, which DD provided. The Dancing Dagger nerf was huge to S/D, taking away its primary burst ability and leaving nothing worthwhile in its place. DD is an inferior closing ability to sword #2, and retains the same expensive cost it did pre-nerf. This crippled a more conservative and control-based weapon set with absolutely no upside to the change.

P/D – Dancing Dagger was the one and only multi-target damage skill this set had. A set that is heavily ranged based and already has a #3 gap closer. The last thing P/D needs is an expensive low-damage ranged cripple instead of having some minor AE capability in a pinch.

So by nerfing this burst skill, the already powerful burst weapon set was largely unaffected, and build variety was crippled by removing DD’s ability to execute its role in other weapon sets.

5. Cloak and Dagger – A rather solid skill that is thieves’ primary method of attaining stealth via weapon skills. Its power and utility are well-balanced by the heavy initiative cost and it is one of the only thief weapon skills that is not viably spammable due to how the revealed debuff works. In PvP it received a heavy nerf recently which shares some of the similar attributes of the DD nerf. Namely, it did very little to the capabilities of D/D, but removed an option for S/D or P/D to increase damage output via initiative dumping.

-Pistol-
Generally considered to be the weakest weapon option overall for thieves. Pistol has a lot of potential due to a good mix of utility, power-based options, and condition-based options. In my opinion, a lot of the controversy rises from thieves as a whole trying to min/max towards damage roles, which pistol doesn’t excel at as much at some of the other weapon sets (possible exception of P/D). Still, there are some definite skill issues that, if resolved, could make pistol shine as a thief weapon.

1. Vital Shot – In a word, bland. 900 range, decent damage, no chain, simply a pistol shot that causes a bleed. The split of the damage between power and condition makes it unattractive to min/maxing towards one stat. Not a bad thing, but it doesn’t help pistol’s popularity. Sneak Attack, however, is an excellent from-stealth skill. It shares the split damage dilemma of Vital Shot, but has the damage to back it up and hit-volume benefits to boot. The downside is that this excellent stealth skill is only really available to P/D since P/P lacks any kind of organic stealth.

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Posted by: Tulisin.6945

Tulisin.6945

2. Body Shot – To be blunt: Probably the worst weapon skill thieves have. It lacks power, it lacks real utility, it lacks a reason to hit #2 with a pistol. I think developers overestimate the utility that Vulnerability can bring, even a 5-stacker. The incredibly weak DPS that the long animation and low damage of this skill will cause a thief to have means that even up to a 5-man group this skill won’t likely result in a net increase in damage, since the thief is self-nerfing their own output so much to contribute to others. That means this skill has little use in dungeons and other 5-man situations where vulnerability is conventionally most powerful. Less people around? Absolutely useless. More people around (open world DEs)? Either mobs are dying so fast that vulnerability makes no difference or there are so many people around (>25) that vulnerability is permanently max-stacked by default without the thief making this rather huge (initiative/time) investment to stack it with Body Shot. I’m not sure how to fix body shot, but increasing the damage of the ability enough that the vulnerability stacks are a boost instead of a poor tradeoff would be a good start.

3. P/D – Shadow Strike – The problem with Shadow Strike is that it is a gap-creator, but P/D is not a ranged weapon set. P/D is most effective in melee because P/D’s most effective combo is Cloak and Dagger->Sneak Attack. Shadow Strike would be theoretically good if P/D wanted to dictate that kind of range. Basically Shadow Strike shares the problem that some other thief skills have of designers anticipating how weapon sets are going to be used and being dead wrong. A mobility-based skill for the P/D dual skill is a good idea, but it should be something that allows the weapon set to move in and out of melee range, not solely away. Just another example of how immalleable skills tend to be considered the worst.

P/P – Unload – It is…not…bad, but it isn’t good either. Unload is pistol’s only pure power damage based skill. It simultaneously has the most power-based DPS of any pistol skill while also having mediocre DPS as a whole (lower than the melee auto attacks). Is the ranged nature a viable tradeoff for dumping so much initiative for that kind of DPS? Hard to say. I’d like to see Unload have something else going for it, maybe piercing shots for some pistol AE capability?

4. Headshot – Excellent utility ability for PvP interrupts and stripping stacks of boss immunity in PvE. Downside to a spammable interrupt being that the damage is quite mediocre. The favorite suggestion I’ve heard to make this one a little more interesting is to give it a 100 % crit rate (it is a headshot, after all). This isn’t a dramatic boost due to its low base damage, but it does give it some unique synergy with on-crit procs, potentially allowing builds that don’t invest heavily into precision the opportunity to utilize some procs.

5. Black Powder – Pulsing AE blind? Yes please. Excellent utility ability and one of thieves’ only weapon-skill-based combo fields. The tradeoff being that it is rather expensive. I’d like to see a minor pulsing damage component on Black Powder to give pistol a little more AE capability and synergy with on-hit procs. It is also odd that Black Powder creates the blind field at the thief’s feet, instead of where the black powder shot impacts. Changing that to the more logical positioning (blind field on target) would allow BP to be used more effectively for siege combat and the like.

-Harpoon Gun-
Thief water combat suffers from the same problems as most professions. It isn’t necessarily weak, but it isn’t fun either. The fact that many traits and utility skills don’t work in water makes water combat feel clunky and boring, something to be avoided. Add in that water hampers thieves’ excellent on-land mobility and most thieves try to avoid the water.

1. Piercing Shot – See vital shot. Simultaneously boring and not directed towards power or conditions enough to be excellent with either. It isn’t bad, it isn’t good, it isn’t anything. At least it has piercing capability. The Ripper suffers from the overall weakness of thief underwater combat: There’s no way to get into stealth, no weapon skills offer it, there’s no combo fields, and most stealth utilities don’t work under water. So you’re pretty much only going to see an underwater stealth attack if the thief brought the stealth-on-heal skill, and then you might see one once a minute.

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Posted by: Tulisin.6945

Tulisin.6945

2. Deluge – Underwater Unload, wooo. Mediocre DPS, boring, not fun to use. I’d like to see more spice on these kinds of abilities but honestly my personal solution to the problem is to avoid the water at all costs. 20 % combo finisher in an environment that doesn’t really have combo fields?

3. Escape – It creates range, but so little range and with such a long animation that it doesn’t actually do much. The poison dissipates almost immediately and will rarely apply to anything, and even if it did it stacks one second at a time. Make it an underwater poison combo field that actually lasts a while and it might see more use.

4. Disabling Shot – I guess it is supposed to be used to kite? This is a ranged set, but the mobility lost trying to get one of these off is barely made up for by the cripple even if someone doesn’t dodge the extremely slow projectile. In PvE mobs have ungodly water mobility regardless, especially compared to underwater thief mobility.

5. In Shot – An example of a skill shot that could actually be pretty interesting as a land-based skill. Not very useful in water though, nearly impossible to effectively aim for blinds, and the slow projectile speed means it can’t be used to quickly traverse ground thanks to the thief being able to swim to the point faster than a projectile can reach it. Most useful attribute is the ability to be able to shoot it, swim the other way, and then be teleported back in the initial direction to confuse people chasing you. So much potential for skill-based play with an ability like this, but water is just a bad environment.

-Spear-
See above for comments on water combat. Spear is no better than spear gun.

1. Stab→Jab→Poison Tip Strike – It has AE capability and applies poison, not bad on paper but the long activation time for the #2/#3 parts of the chain make water combat feel even clunkier than it already is. The stealth attack, Deadly Strike, sure looks like fun, but see above for why it’ll rarely ever actually get used.

2. Flanking Strike – Oddly enough the slow nature of underwater combat actually makes this more successful than its ground-based S/D counterpart. Unfortunately, as previously discussed vulnerability isn’t particularly good, and for an evade-based attack this is utterly overshadowed by #5.

3. Nine-Tailed Strike → Break Stance – A skill chain that simultaneously makes thief underwater combat decently powerful while being utterly boring. Most PvE can be accomplished with this skill alone. Another skill I’d love to see a variation of on land, but under water it is just a clunky slow solution to a clunky slow problem.

4. Tow Line – Why? Between the animation of throwing it, the travel time, and the fact that you basically knock yourself down to close with your target. When you stand up the net result is that your target has moved out to exactly where they were before, cripple has worn off, and you’re in the same situation you started with 4 less initiative and having done one weak hit of damage. I don’t think I’ve ever hit this ability on purpose and not immediately regretted it. Make it an underwater spammable scorpion wire? Now we’re talking, and it might actually solve some mobility issues for underwater combat.

5. Shadow Assault – See #3, it is simultaneously effective and painfully boring to use, particularly because one of the best ways to get along in underwater combat as a thief is to pretty much spam this all day. I’d like to stress that I don’t think this is too powerful, it isn’t as if there’s incentive to jump in the water to use these awesome skills, they’re just the best of a bad situation.

tl;dr for water – Whole thing needs an overhaul before a water-heavy content expansion hits.

-Healing Skills-
Honestly, thief healing skills are well balanced, as evidenced by the constant debate about which one to use, and the fact that so many different thieves prefer different healing skills. They’ve each got useful attributes and downsides, easily the most well-balanced skill slot thieves have.

Hide in Shadows – A reliable stealth, damage condition removal and the biggest raw heal thieves get, in return for the longest CD and lack of mobility elements. Great as a get-out-of-jail-free card.

Signet of Malice – Constant healing that encourages an offensive proactive playstyle as opposed to one that uses its heal reactively. Most potential for synergy of any heal, both because it has an on-hit proc and because it is a signet. Can be used in a pinch for a burst heal and extra signet effects if traited. Also ends up being thieves’ lowest CD signet, even lower with traits.

Withdraw – Mobility-based heal that evades/moves the thief and cures mobility-based conditions. Fairly potent heal if used on the rather short 15-second timer.

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Posted by: Tulisin.6945

Tulisin.6945

-Utilities-
Thief utilities run the gamut from awesome to useless, some have innate power that is largely unaffected by traits, and some really shine when properly synergized.

Blinding Powder – Excellent utility trait overshadowed by Shadow Refuge in terms of stealth capability, but the shorter CD, offensive blind component, and fact that you can simply take both let it hold its own very well in the arena of thief utilities.

Shadow Refuge – Gold standard for thief utilities, providing desirable group benefit, an escape option, a set-up opportunity for attacks, an open-world movement enhancer, etc. Just an amazing skill that manages to be universally useful without doing anything gamebreaking on the offense side.

Shadowstep – Same tier in use as Shadow Refuge, excellent mobility skill and dual stun break with condition removal. Easy to use, hard to master.

Smoke Screen – Solid group utility often overlooked by thieves more concerned with offense. The ability to block projectiles is situationally extremely helpful. Doesn’t really lack anything.

Assassin’s Signet – Here’s where we run into a problem. Assassin’s Signet, to me, is like Back Stab. It is boring, straight-forward, and lacks synergy. The passive bonus is mediocre (as expected for a passive) and the active is only really useful high high-damage-low-volume attacks, which relegates it to a few dagger strikes. It just doesn’t play nice with most weapon sets, and isn’t particularly interesting. On the upside, it is a signet with all the juicy signet traiting that entails, but there’s definite room for improvement with a rework. I’m curious what would happen if this skill gave 5 seconds of 20-stack vulnerability, for instance. That’d imply some more group utility while retaining the personal burst use, but not just for low-volume attacks.

Infiltrator’s Signet – Underappreciated in the thief world as a short-cooldown stunbreak with a relatively useful passive that actually synergizes fairly well with traits. You can feed initiative from this signet into healing, for instance, with the initiative->healing trait from Acrobatics. Overall a solid skill

Signet of Shadows – A bit overrated in most situations. Excellent for cross-world travel for thieves not equipped for swiftness, and the passive has some combat applications. Good thieves that know when to use the active blind and are traited for signet use will get the most out of it. It is a good dynamic as-is, with thieves using it for convenience and either growing out of it as they realize that it lacks combat applications or growing into it as they learn how to use it properly.

Signet of Agility – At first glance not particularly impressive, but easily one of the most powerful thief utilities. This skill is the poster child for skills that gain power through synergy. Investment in the right traits and supporting skills turn this one into a powerhouse, but even the newest thief can pick it up and use it as a get-out-of-jail free card with the condition removal and bonus dodges.

Ambush – Most commonly used as a direct pet summon by placing it literally on top of your opponent in melee range. It doesn’t really benefit much from being a trap and would be a much superior skill if it simply summoned a thief pet. Theoretically the “trap” ability type would be an asset to a thief traited for traps, but traps are so mediocre as it stands that few thieves see this as an advantage.

Needle Trap – Suffers, like all traps, from being a significant investment (eating a slot, positioning it, getting your opponent to go over it) for a relatively small payoff. Most thieves wouldn’t take this utility skill if it was a straight-up attack that could be used every 30 seconds, let alone a pre-positioned trap. The best solution I’ve heard for the trap issue is as follows: Give them a much longer duration, and make them re-arm themselves after a given time period. This makes traps a long term ground holding investment wherein a thief can create an unfriendly environment for their enemies. Reset time would vary by trap, but this one would do well being able to go off every 10~ seconds

Shadow Trap – More interesting after the recent change. Has some unique uses for thieves looking to quickly traverse a lot of ground, and there’s a lot of room for mastery here. Avoids the traditional weaknesses of traps by being movement-based instead of trying to kill things.

Tripwire – See needle trap for trap fix suggestion. Either tripwire needs to be able to trip someone up every 5-10 seconds, or it needs to be able to trip a lot more than one person.

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Posted by: Jack of Tears.9458

Jack of Tears.9458

A bunch of hyperbole later

There ya have it, the Thief is Chuck Norris.

Okay, so the skill you’re crying about reflecting your attacks is called “Dagger Storm”, that’s important ‘cause when you see people talking about being mad “Dancing Dagger” got nerfed we don’t want you thinking about the wrong skill. And, Dagger Storm is our big Antirange Elite – that’s what it does, then it goes on a nice long cool down.

And I wanna know who’s auto healing to full when they stealth so I can copy that build.


I’m sorry I stepped outta yer box, don’ worry, if
ya whine enough they’ll put me right back.

The thief and its gameplay - Your feedback [Merged]

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Posted by: Tulisin.6945

Tulisin.6945

Haste – A relatively well-balanced ability in a vacuum that creates issues in PvP when combined with the initiative system. Being able to spam high-damage abilities results in very short time-to-kill in some PvP situations. The problem is that the solution seems to have been largely to weaken the base abilities instead of attacking quickness as the root of the problem. My Quickness fix: Make it stack-based at 10 % increased attack speed up to 10 attacks, this allows you to selectively control how powerful a given Quickness buff is. Haste and similar activated Quickness could be nerfed to 7/8 stacks (70-80 %), or even 5 stacks for longer duration, while things that aren’t unbalanced like proc quickness could stay at 10 stacks.

Roll for Initiative – A solid mobility-based utility and mobility condition removal hampered by a long CD. This was likely pre-nerfed due to worries over the substantial initiative gain. I’d like to see the skill become more granular by making it a 3 initiative boost with a 30 second CD.

Scorpion Wire – Situationally exceptional, especially now that it reaches out to 1200 range. Hit detection leaves something to be desired in many cases, maybe give it slightly faster flight time?

The Venoms – Yeah, I’m lumping them all in here because they all pretty much have the same issues. They all get used up whenever an offensive attack is launched, even if it doesn’t connect, and they’re all pretty mediocre unless traited for. I’ve seen some ideas for venom revamps to give them passive and active effects, and I’m inclined to agree that something like that would be desirable. Perhaps each venom has a passive % chance to apply on hit, with the active being as it is now to ensure the effect?

-Elites-
One of these things is not like the other, see if you can spot which elite is highly situational and disliked.

Thieves’ Guild – A powerhouse elite that can make a huge difference in a small-numbers fight. Completely fire-and-forget, due to the nature of pets. Unfortunately, as a Charr thief this ends up completely negating a racial, but oh well. The pets do good damage and have useful utility. Potential for venom-share synergy is nice. Balanced out by a long CD and generally a well-liked elite.

Basilisk Venom – 1s cast time for a 1.5s stun? As an elite? Absolutely terrible. The problem with BV is that it must necessarily be balanced around people who are running full Venom Synergy, which more than doubles the use of this elite. However, that means people who aren’t running those specific builds get a very mediocre elite. Worst part? This is our only elite underwater. Heck, the thieves can swim, just let us summon them under water, BV is terrible enough without forcing it in those situations. Easy fix? Make BV a utility skill. Most thieves still wouldn’t use it, it is that mediocre, but it has a viable power level as a utility skill. Come up with a new thief elite to replace it.

Dagger Storm – Somewhat controversial amongst thieves. The fact is that it is a powerful elite, but is somewhat situational. There’s nothing wrong with the fact that it isn’t much use in a 1v1, it definitely has a time and a place, and great synergy potential.

-Downed Skills-
Thief downed skills can be very annoying to opponents in PvP, but they don’t offer much hope of direct recovery in PvE unless the thief can combine #2/3 to move away and stealth.

1. Trail of Knives – Good for tagging lots of NPCs in an attempt to rally. Poor direct DPS, but giving it too much damage creates a potential risk with the +50 % downed damage trait. Only problem I really have with it is that it is thieves’ only offensive skill while downed, so it necessitates getting spammed a lot.
2. Shadow Escape – A solid quick-reaction downed skill that synergizes well with #3 and generally fits thieves thematically. Not hard to counter, but then none of the profession #2 downed skills are.
3. Smoke Bomb – Just a little short and slow. If smoke bomb blinded or had a 3/4s duration it’d be just perfect. The short stealth in PvE means it often won’t save a downed thief since mobs need one or two more seconds to lose interest and wander away, especially if they have to finish channeling whatever they’re doing.

The thief and its gameplay - Your feedback [Merged]

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Posted by: Tulisin.6945

Tulisin.6945

-General Requests-

I’d like to see Burning and possibly Confusion available to thieves overall.
I’d like to see boons available from thief weapon skills. There’s plenty of conditions, but no might, aegis, stability, etc? A lot of room to build on Acrobatics (boon duration trait tree) synergy here.
I’d like to see a sword offhand with aegis, block, or projectile reflect as a defensive weapon skill measure.
I’d like to see some trait-based synergy with blind. There’s a trait that applies weakness on poison, how about vulnerability on blind?
More weapon/utility skills that play with endurance. Endurance play supports skill-based play and is a good way to make thief mobility more dynamic.

-Traits-
NOPE, tired of typing, maybe later.

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Posted by: jedishin.9731

jedishin.9731

Small adjustment to the trap set when ressurecting would be beneficial, currently the oblong shape if it goes down in the wrong direction allows you to be melee attacked but it wont trip the trap, perhaps make it round. When done correctly and combined with ambush trap and thieves guild I have been able to pop 4 support thieves, but the rez trap is too unreliable to be consistently effective. Cosmetically, can we try sticking to THIEVES and stop trying to make us look like ERROL FLYNN, this is not PIRATES OF PENZANCE. Allow access to the rifle class for range weapons.

Our chief weapons are Fear, Fear and Surprise!