Guild Wars 2

Ragnarox.9601:

DanH.5879:

dude, i have to melee with med armor and lowest hp pool, wtf….

you have stealth 90% of the time so don’t complain
lowest have guardian.

Guardians have Protection/Aegis/Stability/Reflect/Heavy Armour or a mixture of them at pretty much all times. Thieves have the ability to not be targeted directly, but no damage mitigation.

frans.8092:

None of the workarounds these actually work, weaponswap is on a 10 second cooldown. caltrops even longer. Mobs should simply not reset in 2 seconds, timer could easily be set to 5 or even 10 seconds.

my reply:
I agree here, 10 sec may be a little long, even for 5 sec thief would need a longer stealth than most in this game allow, but it does make since. I am not even seeing 2 sec as is unless they are in the middle of a maintain. Some one punches you in the face at the bar and vanishes, you gonna sit back down right away like nothing happened, or you gonna look for the S.O.B.? It would be cool if they were spending 3 sec scouting for you at least before giving up. As is, I have 4-5 ways to stealth on my build/weapon selection, you can literally Yo-Yo an enemy to death, hit-stealth-hit-stealth-ect. (as long as you re-hit fast enough so their health does not fully reset) taking no damage because the NPC just really wants to sit back down. The first video I watched of the beta was of a thief, in the video it was stated stealth causes a problem with resetting mobs in pve situations which can limit use of stealth. In a lot of games rogue types use stealth as a means to get away, to increase damage of your next attack, open certain stun abilities, and other general tactics. I don’t see the problem being the stealth but more so the intelligence of the mobs. Here’s an example that maybe even makes me look bad: Last night I took 4 friends into AC story, they are all new to the game and it was their first dungeon experience and I was helping them learn the fights. On the Captain with 15 ghosts we killed the 15 and my friends all died with just me left up, I stealthed which reset the boss long enough for them to release exploiting against the new No-Res-Rush policy, I hit the boss fast enough that he did not fully reset his health, then I continued to hit-stealth over and over until everyone was back taking a portion of the bosses health and keeping him generally in combat. Honestly, this should have either been a full wipe, or a full reset if I just stealth and run. Though if the boss had a program to keep looking for 3 sec. for me, this would not have been possible because he would have stayed in combat while scouting. The way I feel it should go: In a group situation give the boss a 50-50 chance to scout me, or reset aggro elsewhere, in solo situations 100% chance to scout keeping the NPC in combat. Now, I am not saying that his scouting should always be completely aggressive with full blown out AoE fire, just give them the 3 seconds of looking around scratching their head, or checking under rocks, or what ever. Maybe if an AoE is on their play list, give them somewhere between 5-20% chance to use it in their scouting.

This is not a rework directly to Thief or other stealthers as much as it is a rework to NPC for PvE

I don’t care too much about the insane damage thieves do. Even though its over the top I’ll let them have it. BUT the stealth needs a rework. allowing perma stealth thieves to exist it just stupid. Sure allow them to stealth now and again but not every few seconds. If I thief comes out of stealth to attack let them take the risk for that. and if someone manages to guess where a thief is let them knock the thief out of stealth.

keep the damage, rework the stealth.

Thobek.1730:

I don’t care too much about the insane damage thieves do. Even though its over the top I’ll let them have it. BUT the stealth needs a rework. allowing perma stealth thieves to exist it just stupid. Sure allow them to stealth now and again but not every few seconds. If I thief comes out of stealth to attack let them take the risk for that. and if someone manages to guess where a thief is let them knock the thief out of stealth.

keep the damage, rework the stealth.

Thief would need an increase in damage and max health if they had stealth nerfed.

Magiofdeath.2745:

My observations:

I am farming some mobs in frostgorge and saw a thief kill a lvl 80 mob in 1 hit with backstab. So I asked him if he does that in WvW and his reply was all the time. Screenshot attached for proof of this. Sure, he could just be saying that, but I’ve seen the exact same thing happen in WvW. Maybe not 1 hit, but I’ve seen them kill in 2. The fact that they can stealth from what roughly seems every 5 seconds is also slightly ridiculous. A thief without any support set can solo a supply camp as well. If you’re any other class, you will most likely need some support equipment to take a supply camp yourself.

I’m sure I’m going to get flamed for this, but this is just my observations.

Maybe its just because I’m a condition build, but I wish I could kill a lvl 80 as a ranger in 1 hit.

A warrior can kill a frostforge mob just as fast. So can a ranger, guardian, elementalist, engineer, and mesmer with the right glass cannon setup.

Seems like you have a problem with glass cannon builds, not the thief.

Columba.9730:

100% crit, 16k health, 3k armor and 2800 attack.

Can you ask your thief guildmate to list out his equipment, traits, food taken & buff from allies to achieve about stats? I’m sure every one who is rolling Thief will want to know how it is possible to get those delicious stats while in ‘perma stealth’ build.

The thief class is a poorly thought out and fails the basic tests of balance for pvp. The pvp side of this game will die and looking back everyone will be able to say it is because of the broken stealth mechanics. For a game that relies on visuals to be played it is surprising they implemented stealth as invisibility rather then some sort of camouflage. Culling makes it worse since there is nothing for you to click on to re-target and there is no target nearest enemy player. You have to go through a whole list of pve trash mobs in wvw and all the ranger/ele/necro pets in spvp. And then they vanish again.

Until Anet wakes up i am done. Every flavor of the month class/build that does not abuse the stealth mechanics is at least fun to play against. Not a single thief build is. For the trolls i am sure they are fun to play which is why you see so many of them popping up here spouting the l2p or you got to build to counter thieves “advice”. The sheer amount of complaints about stealth and the same “advice” popping up should be a clue. And not a single vid of someone saying here is how you counter a thief, without the vid being of a thief.

An interesting test would be for anet where to open a wvw and spvp area that was open to all but thieves i wonder how many would flock to it. Just open a sign up sheet.

There are just too many games out to waste anymore time on one that just does not get it. I am sure this post will not change anyones’ mind but i figured i would let Anet know why i am uninstalled seeing how the web link they give you when you uninstall asking why you are leaving is broken, here it is.

Cya around.

Shadowkx.2738:

The thief class is a poorly thought out and fails the basic tests of balance for pvp. The pvp side of this game will die and looking back everyone will be able to say it is because of the broken stealth mechanics. For a game that relies on visuals to be played it is surprising they implemented stealth as invisibility rather then some sort of camouflage. Culling makes it worse since there is nothing for you to click on to re-target and there is no target nearest enemy player. You have to go through a whole list of pve trash mobs in wvw and all the ranger/ele/necro pets in spvp. And then they vanish again.

Until Anet wakes up i am done. Every flavor of the month class/build that does not abuse the stealth mechanics is at least fun to play against. Not a single thief build is. For the trolls i am sure they are fun to play which is why you see so many of them popping up here spouting the l2p or you got to build to counter thieves “advice”. The sheer amount of complaints about stealth and the same “advice” popping up should be a clue. And not a single vid of someone saying here is how you counter a thief, without the vid being of a thief.

An interesting test would be for anet where to open a wvw and spvp area that was open to all but thieves i wonder how many would flock to it. Just open a sign up sheet.

There are just too many games out to waste anymore time on one that just does not get it. I am sure this post will not change anyones’ mind but i figured i would let Anet know why i am uninstalled seeing how the web link they give you when you uninstall asking why you are leaving is broken, here it is.

Cya around.

I love playing against thieves on my necromancer. :>

When the kitten are my traps getting fixed.
Hell when are they getting buffed?
These things are basically for chocking narrow pathways horizontally, Fairly meh.
Shadow trap is thematically cool. Ambush is cool. Tripwire and needletrap make me sad, brb have to use them like melee skills because it’s too likely opponent will hit the corner and made them 24s of worthlessness.
Also fix Scorpion wire obstruction on literally nothing on a flat flipping plane.

Also corrosive traps is gaaarrrbaaage atm. So much bugs messing it up. Should’ve made it give stacks of might brah, then it would be a beast-mode trait. Oh well.

Lol… Why role ranger if a thief can damage 3k on there bow. Lol why role a class that a lot of AOE if they want to nerf the AOE damage. Lol why you need to farm for your armor when thief can just 2 or 3 hits you. Lol why fighting a thief if they just run to you using there unlimited stealth. Lol why posting here if moderator delete always my post? Lol. Lol. Lol. Fighting thief is 101% boring. But its ok this is just one time buy and free to play game. But atleast they did a good job for this. This the only free to play game that make a good deal for us. Good graphics and no lag., except if your net is slow., this is mean that you need a thief in your class creation. So if you are anoyed by thief you can just log in your thief too.. Thats the only solution for this… Thank you enjoy playing thief

Doomdesire.9365:

Magiofdeath.2745:

My observations:

I am farming some mobs in frostgorge and saw a thief kill a lvl 80 mob in 1 hit with backstab. So I asked him if he does that in WvW and his reply was all the time. Screenshot attached for proof of this. Sure, he could just be saying that, but I’ve seen the exact same thing happen in WvW. Maybe not 1 hit, but I’ve seen them kill in 2. The fact that they can stealth from what roughly seems every 5 seconds is also slightly ridiculous. A thief without any support set can solo a supply camp as well. If you’re any other class, you will most likely need some support equipment to take a supply camp yourself.

I’m sure I’m going to get flamed for this, but this is just my observations.

Maybe its just because I’m a condition build, but I wish I could kill a lvl 80 as a ranger in 1 hit.

A warrior can kill a frostforge mob just as fast. So can a ranger, guardian, elementalist, engineer, and mesmer with the right glass cannon setup.

Seems like you have a problem with glass cannon builds, not the thief.

Seems like you dont know what is 1 hit?
Ranger, mesmmer, elem, guardian, engineer, necro they can’t do a 1 hit strike. Lol
Even they are GC build.,

jan.9745:

Doomdesire.9365:

Magiofdeath.2745:

My observations:

I am farming some mobs in frostgorge and saw a thief kill a lvl 80 mob in 1 hit with backstab. So I asked him if he does that in WvW and his reply was all the time. Screenshot attached for proof of this. Sure, he could just be saying that, but I’ve seen the exact same thing happen in WvW. Maybe not 1 hit, but I’ve seen them kill in 2. The fact that they can stealth from what roughly seems every 5 seconds is also slightly ridiculous. A thief without any support set can solo a supply camp as well. If you’re any other class, you will most likely need some support equipment to take a supply camp yourself.

I’m sure I’m going to get flamed for this, but this is just my observations.

Maybe its just because I’m a condition build, but I wish I could kill a lvl 80 as a ranger in 1 hit.

A warrior can kill a frostforge mob just as fast. So can a ranger, guardian, elementalist, engineer, and mesmer with the right glass cannon setup.

Seems like you have a problem with glass cannon builds, not the thief.

Seems like you dont know what is 1 hit?
Ranger, mesmmer, elem, guardian, engineer, necro they can’t do a 1 hit strike. Lol
Even they are GC build.,

Contrary to what you seem to believe, a GC Thief can’t one shot everything, or many things for that matter in end game. BSing a Champion or a great deal of Veterans is a bad idea as a glass cannon. BS an enemy in the middle of a mob is also a bad idea. Why? You won’t kill the Vet or Champion, and then you’d aggro them. You may kill the normal mob, but you’ll aggro its group.

jan.9745:

Seems like you dont know what is 1 hit?
Ranger, mesmmer, elem, guardian, engineer, necro they can’t do a 1 hit strike. Lol
Even they are GC build.,

I can’t speak for all the classes here but do you know that the Elementalist Churning Earth spell does more damage than Backstab?

Daecollo.9578:

Thobek.1730:

I don’t care too much about the insane damage thieves do. Even though its over the top I’ll let them have it. BUT the stealth needs a rework. allowing perma stealth thieves to exist it just stupid. Sure allow them to stealth now and again but not every few seconds. If I thief comes out of stealth to attack let them take the risk for that. and if someone manages to guess where a thief is let them knock the thief out of stealth.

keep the damage, rework the stealth.

Thief would need an increase in damage and max health if they had stealth nerfed.

it wouldn’t be a nerf as much as an adjustment or workaround to deal with culling. At the moment thieves are allow to get off a number of free hits without appearing. Perhaps the reveal debuff should be increase to compensate for Anet poor culling problems.

the revealed effect is only 3 seconds, take off a few for culling and you basically have one second to target them before they land another backstab combo on you. Some classes don’t have melee attacks and can’t spam to even hit a stealthed thief.

this compounded with the issue is even if you do put up some kind of defense against a thief, it will not reveal them unless that backstab hits.

basically most thief fights are you dodging around blinding, putting on defenses, dropping same AoE fields around your feet waiting to get blown up. After that one second you get to hit them they vanish and reposition themselves (while gaining initative), you have to repeat the same stupid cycle before another crazy backstab hits you.

actually I’m not even sure an adjustment to the revealed effect would be enough.

stof.9341:

jan.9745:

Seems like you dont know what is 1 hit?
Ranger, mesmmer, elem, guardian, engineer, necro they can’t do a 1 hit strike. Lol
Even they are GC build.,

I can’t speak for all the classes here but do you know that the Elementalist Churning Earth spell does more damage than Backstab?

To original post, not the person i’m quoting:
Also, thieves don’t 1 hit anything. Backstab requires a setup skill. Why does everyone keeps forgetting that?

in case you didn’t noticed the revealed debuff is 4 seconds !
3.9s….3.8s….3.7sec……1.1sec….1.0sec…0.9sec….0.2sec….0.1sec….0 now you may cloak again.
just because culling delays that, is not our fault !!!

Hello,

We really appreciate your concerns & feedback about the thief, and the time you spent here discussing about this.

However, in order to gather feedback efficiently, we ask to stay constructive and polite here, you can express your opinion about different aspects of the thief, but please respect others opinions and avoid personal attacks.

Thank you for your understanding.

oZii.2864:

Well the Stealth is main part of the theif class. You receive those same benefits from the main part of your class stealth is just extra. You can get might on shatter, invulnerability, remove condition on shatter and remove condition on heal (actually anyone can get this with a food) random condition from clones killed, confusion from clones killed, cripple from clones killed, more damage for each active clone, move faster for each active clone etc.

Notice the theme is clones you also have the most stun breaks in the game which are really good and useful. Notice thieves don’t have clones so I cant compare them because they aren’t the same class. You can’t compare classes like that.

You get 1200m range access pretty easily you have spells (phantasms) that basically auto cast for you almost every 6 seconds and do alot of damage (berserker) really. Come on man! At a fight starting out at 1200m range against a target that you can see you can have so many clones out that you almost die trying to get to the real mesmer. I’m not complaining about mesmers as that was my first class level 80 with a legendary and all. Now I play thief level 80 with a legendary on it also. You can’t compare thieves and mesmers its different.

I wish I had access to stability, a invulnerable spell, good aoe damage, protection, etc. I don’t have access to those.

Also a mesmer has access to 5 ways to go invisible Blink, Mass invis, The prestige, Veil, and the trait for invis at 25% health. Nobody runs that trait that I know of so lets say 4 instead of just the 3 you listed.

Lets use a typical backstab thief on his hotbar he probably has Cloak and Dagger, and either refuge or Blinding powder. 2 skills but he could have 3. Now this should pretty much show you that you can’t compare the 2 in a vacuum like you did.

I’m sorry, but that’s just not true. The main part of the Thief is burst damage, that’s why initiative was created; to allow the Thief a better burst potential then other professions. Stealth is a part of the Thief, in the same way movement is. But that is the exact problem; players think stealth is the main factor of the Thief, because the Thief has too much of it! The Thief is not an Assassin, there’s difference there (or was at least). Stealth was originally build to be a tool that allowed the Thief to move while avoiding damage. It was not made to be a deception tool like clones are, and neither was it used like it when the Thief was first released. Problem is that ArenaNet haven’t been balancing the stealth for the Thief over time, and players have taken advantage of this, leaving us with the result we have today, where players are running around in close to permanent stealth. Stealth for the Thief needs to be pulled back to what it originally was; a movement tool.

The Thief has shadow stepping (free on steal) and superior movement, which means distance is not a problem at all. If you gave the Thief 1200 range, on top of all the shadow stepping and stealth, it would be completely overpowered. Dagger Storm gives the Thief stability (perfect to use when you are low on initiative), movement in a combination with stealth is all the invulnerability you need as a Thief (beats the hell out of distortion), the shortbow has better AoE then the Mesmer could ever hope to have (just the #1 skill alone kills clones ridiculously fast), the Mesmer doesn’t have any protection skills other then Chaos Storm (which is random).

Okay, so let’s get all the stealth down:

Mesmer: The Prestige (weapon 3s), Decoy (utility 3s), Veil (utility 3s), Mass Invisibility (elite 5s), Desperate Decoy (trait 3s)

Thief: Cloak and Dagger (weapon 3s, or 6s if you use it twice), Hide in Shadows (healing 3s), Blinding Powder (utility 3s), Shadow Refuge (utility 10s), Shadow Trap (utility 5s), Blinding Tuft (stolen skill 3s), Hidden Thief (trait 3s), Instinctual Response (trait 3s), Smoke Screen (utility blast/leap combo 10s/3s), Black Powder (weapon blast/leap combo 10s/3s)

And here’s the benefits the Thief and Mesmer get from going/being in stealth:

Mesmer: Prismatic Understanding (stealth last 1 second longer, gain a protective boon)

Thief: Meld with Shadows (stealth last 1 second longer), Fleet Shadow (move 50% faster while in stealth), Hidden Assassin (gain might), Hidden Killer (100% crit chance while stealthed), Shadow Protector (grant targets of your stealth skills regeneration), Infusion of Shadow (gain 2 initiative when using a skill that stealths), Patience (regain initiative faster), Shadow’s Embrace (remove one condition every three seconds), Shadow’s Rejuvenation (regenerate health)

It’s pretty clear that if you removed stealth from weapon and healing skills, which would balance stealth a great deal, the Thief would still have superior stealth to the Mesmer. It’s not even close.

Gwalchgwn.1659:

stof.9341:

jan.9745:

Seems like you dont know what is 1 hit?
Ranger, mesmmer, elem, guardian, engineer, necro they can’t do a 1 hit strike. Lol
Even they are GC build.,

I can’t speak for all the classes here but do you know that the Elementalist Churning Earth spell does more damage than Backstab?

To original post, not the person i’m quoting:
Also, thieves don’t 1 hit anything. Backstab requires a setup skill. Why does everyone keeps forgetting that?

Its astonishing how much enlightenment you always get in the Thieves Forums. I was not aware of Churning Earth possibly doing more damage than Backstab.

I mean it IS surprising after all: A skill which requires just a cast time of 3 1/4s, has no aoe warning circle whatsoever, misses a unique and visible casting animation is definately unpredictable. That kitten spammable 30s cooldown skill, which on top can not be interupted or easily dogged and does not need any “setting up skill” which grants e.g. stability is indeed comparable to backstab. I seem to always forget that. kitten you Churning Earth, kitten you!

Kasama.8941:

oZii.2864:

Snip

I’m sorry, but that’s just not true. The main part of the Thief is burst damage, that’s why initiative was created; to allow the Thief a better burst potential then other professions. Stealth is a part of the Thief, in the same way movement is. But that is the exact problem; players think stealth is the main factor of the Thief, because the Thief has too much of it! The Thief is not an Assassin, there’s difference there (or was at least). Stealth was originally build to be a tool that allowed the Thief to move while avoiding damage. It was not made to be a deception tool like clones are, and neither was it used like it when the Thief was first released. Problem is that ArenaNet haven’t been balancing the stealth for the Thief over time, and players have taken advantage of this, leaving us with the result we have today, where players are running around in close to permanent stealth. Stealth for the Thief needs to be pulled back to what it originally was; a movement tool.

The Thief has shadow stepping (free on steal) and superior movement, which means distance is not a problem at all. If you gave the Thief 1200 range, on top of all the shadow stepping and stealth, it would be completely overpowered. Dagger Storm gives the Thief stability (perfect to use when you are low on initiative), movement in a combination with stealth is all the invulnerability you need as a Thief (beats the hell out of distortion), the shortbow has better AoE then the Mesmer could ever hope to have (just the #1 skill alone kills clones ridiculously fast), the Mesmer doesn’t have any protection skills other then Chaos Storm (which is random).

Okay, so let’s get all the stealth down:

Mesmer: The Prestige (weapon 3s), Decoy (utility 3s), Veil (utility 3s), Mass Invisibility (elite 5s), Desperate Decoy (trait 3s)

Thief: Cloak and Dagger (weapon 3s, or 6s if you use it twice), Hide in Shadows (healing 3s), Blinding Powder (utility 3s), Shadow Refuge (utility 10s), Shadow Trap (utility 5s), Blinding Tuft (stolen skill 3s), Hidden Thief (trait 3s), Instinctual Response (trait 3s), Smoke Screen (utility blast/leap combo 10s/3s), Black Powder (weapon blast/leap combo 10s/3s)

And here’s the benefits the Thief and Mesmer get from going/being in stealth:

Mesmer: Prismatic Understanding (stealth last 1 second longer, gain a protective boon)

Thief: Meld with Shadows (stealth last 1 second longer), Fleet Shadow (move 50% faster while in stealth), Hidden Assassin (gain might), Hidden Killer (100% crit chance while stealthed), Shadow Protector (grant targets of your stealth skills regeneration), Infusion of Shadow (gain 2 initiative when using a skill that stealths), Patience (regain initiative faster), Shadow’s Embrace (remove one condition every three seconds), Shadow’s Rejuvenation (regenerate health)

It’s pretty clear that if you removed stealth from weapon and healing skills, which would balance stealth a great deal, the Thief would still have superior stealth to the Mesmer. It’s not even close.

Nice Kas. Now explain what P/D and S/D are supposed to do with their bread and butter attack skill locked away in their stealth slot? I’m certainly not going to Flanking Strike someone to death. And P/D’s completely up a creek without regular access to Sneak Attack.

Oh oh oh, and neither of them have burst capabilities.

Griswold.2054:

Gwalchgwn.1659:

stof.9341:

jan.9745:

Seems like you dont know what is 1 hit?
Ranger, mesmmer, elem, guardian, engineer, necro they can’t do a 1 hit strike. Lol
Even they are GC build.,

I can’t speak for all the classes here but do you know that the Elementalist Churning Earth spell does more damage than Backstab?

To original post, not the person i’m quoting:
Also, thieves don’t 1 hit anything. Backstab requires a setup skill. Why does everyone keeps forgetting that?

Its astonishing how much enlightenment you always get in the Thieves Forums. I was not aware of Churning Earth possibly doing more damage than Backstab.

I mean it IS surprising after all: A skill which requires just a cast time of 3 1/4s, has no aoe warning circle whatsoever, misses a unique and visible casting animation is definately unpredictable. That kitten spammable 30s cooldown skill, which on top can not be interupted or easily dogged and does not need any “setting up skill” which grants e.g. stability is indeed comparable to backstab. I seem to always forget that. kitten you Churning Earth, kitten you!

They were debating PvE where NPCs are too stupid to dodge.

Dual.8953:

Griswold.2054:

Gwalchgwn.1659:

stof.9341:

jan.9745:

Seems like you dont know what is 1 hit?
Ranger, mesmmer, elem, guardian, engineer, necro they can’t do a 1 hit strike. Lol
Even they are GC build.,

I can’t speak for all the classes here but do you know that the Elementalist Churning Earth spell does more damage than Backstab?

To original post, not the person i’m quoting:
Also, thieves don’t 1 hit anything. Backstab requires a setup skill. Why does everyone keeps forgetting that?

Its astonishing how much enlightenment you always get in the Thieves Forums. I was not aware of Churning Earth possibly doing more damage than Backstab.

I mean it IS surprising after all: A skill which requires just a cast time of 3 1/4s, has no aoe warning circle whatsoever, misses a unique and visible casting animation is definately unpredictable. That kitten spammable 30s cooldown skill, which on top can not be interupted or easily dogged and does not need any “setting up skill” which grants e.g. stability is indeed comparable to backstab. I seem to always forget that. kitten you Churning Earth, kitten you!

They were debating PvE where NPCs are too stupid to dodge.

And we all know this thread was made because everybody consideres thieves op in PVE … silly me

/edit
To clarify: adjustments made in PVP cause of an comparison of the effectiveness of skills used in PVE is wrong, especially when the balance, use and effect of these skills differ so much depending on in which field there are used.

Im a Ranged Thief, i play with dual pistols and a short bow. i feel as tho thief isnt balanced in the ranged department. Dual daggers on a thief is way stronger than using any other combination especially pistols. my suggestion would be to increase the opening pistol shot from stealth damage, or a rifle with that increased stealth shot damage.

Other than that i feel as tho thief always has to try to balance movement speed with attack when the other classes dont.

Dual.8953:

Nice Kas. Now explain what P/D and S/D are supposed to do with their bread and butter attack skill locked away in their stealth slot? I’m certainly not going to Flanking Strike someone to death. And P/D’s completely up a creek without regular access to Sneak Attack.

Oh oh oh, and neither of them have burst capabilities.

The weapon sets you mention are really more about movement then burst. They are more comparable to the shortbow, then they are to d/d, p/p, or s/p. A solution could be to change Cloak and Dagger into a burst skill. E.g. “rapidly strike your foe five times, dealing 5 seconds weakness on the first hit”. You still have access to stealth skills from three utilities and Steal (if you trait for it of curse). You also still have venoms to improve your condition damage. Removing the stealth from Cloak and Dagger simply just means that you’d have to rely on your utility skills more, just like all other professions.

SOME MYTH BUSTERS!!! WOOOO!!!

(These are all for the basic Glass Cannon WvWvW Thief).

Can a Thief solo a camp in wvwvw? NooOooOoo Not even popping daggerstorm helps, we are way too squishy for it. Only way to do it is picking one mob at a time which takes ages, and any other class can do that also.

Can a Thief ONE SHOT ME? Unless your under lvl 80, and have no toughness or vitality… or defensive boons. Then No. No we cannot. Maybe two shot, if your kittenty and we waste all of our cool-downs on one person.

Can a thief PERMA STEALTH? No, not really. Whether you like it or not initiative does run out, and cool downs can take a while. Can we stealth long enough to kill you? Maybe but we pop out of stealth when dealing damage (excluding already set conditions).

Can a Thief BEAT any class 1v1? No not really. A lot of things play in including spec, gear and player playstyle and skill. Bunker eles, mesmers, guardians, warriors, thiefs, and even well built bunker rangers are VERY difficult to 1v1 for a thief and come out alive.

Can a thief just daggerstorm through a zerg, kill a few people and live? IFFFF the zerg starts shooting PROJECTILES at the theif then yes.. If they melee the thief.. or… CC. Then no way.

Can a person playing a thief character win 1v1 fights while eating hot pockets and doritos at the same time? YES, I do that kitten all the time.

Kasama.8941:

Dual.8953:

Nice Kas. Now explain what P/D and S/D are supposed to do with their bread and butter attack skill locked away in their stealth slot? I’m certainly not going to Flanking Strike someone to death. And P/D’s completely up a creek without regular access to Sneak Attack.

Oh oh oh, and neither of them have burst capabilities.

The weapon sets you mention are really more about movement then burst. They are more comparable to the shortbow, then they are to d/d, p/p, or s/p. A solution could be to change Cloak and Dagger into a burst skill. E.g. “rapidly strike your foe five times, dealing 5 seconds weakness on the first hit”. You still have access to stealth skills from three utilities and Steal (if you trait for it of curse). You also still have venoms to improve your condition damage. Removing the stealth from Cloak and Dagger simply just means that you’d have to rely on your utility skills more, just like all other professions.

So your idea to balance thieves is to give them less access to stealth than a Mesmer based on a bunch of traits available that are rarely taken, and give us another spamable burst skill that can also be used by D/D? Oh, and I’m sure P/D condition builds would be thrilled to have a burst ability on their hot bar! I don’t think you understand how bad of an idea that is.

You certainly embellish the usefulness of some of the stealth traits, I think purposely, to prove a point. But I guess that’s what you have to do to get your way.

Kasama.8941:

I’m sorry, but that’s just not true. The main part of the Thief is burst damage, that’s why initiative was created; to allow the Thief a better burst potential then other professions. Stealth is a part of the Thief, in the same way movement is. But that is the exact problem; players think stealth is the main factor of the Thief, because the Thief has too much of it! The Thief is not an Assassin, there’s difference there (or was at least). Stealth was originally build to be a tool that allowed the Thief to move while avoiding damage. It was not made to be a deception tool like clones are, and neither was it used like it when the Thief was first released. Problem is that ArenaNet haven’t been balancing the stealth for the Thief over time, and players have taken advantage of this, leaving us with the result we have today, where players are running around in close to permanent stealth. Stealth for the Thief needs to be pulled back to what it originally was; a movement tool.

The Thief has shadow stepping (free on steal) and superior movement, which means distance is not a problem at all. If you gave the Thief 1200 range, on top of all the shadow stepping and stealth, it would be completely overpowered. Dagger Storm gives the Thief stability (perfect to use when you are low on initiative), movement in a combination with stealth is all the invulnerability you need as a Thief (beats the hell out of distortion), the shortbow has better AoE then the Mesmer could ever hope to have (just the #1 skill alone kills clones ridiculously fast), the Mesmer doesn’t have any protection skills other then Chaos Storm (which is random).

I would like to know how you came to the conclusion that a thief is not supposed to be an assassin based on your own explanations here. The (D/D) thief highlights burst which the original assassin from GW 1 did. One of the differences though is that the 1-2-3 setup would not have translated to GW2 well. Instead, skills dependant on setup (I.e. stealth) with a 3-4 second window for burst damage was implemented. In exchange for stealth, thieves lost the great protection skills that assassins in GW1 had (see critical defenses, flashing blades, and a couple of others I forgot). As to stealth not being used as it was originally introduced, in design work across all industries your first concept is rarely your last so this really is a moot point. To further highlight that the thief is the logical progression of the GW1 assassin, they share a lot of the same GW1 ability names (see twisting fangs, shadow refuge, the trait trees, the ability to “shadowstep”, etc….). Assassins could face tank in GW1 if they wanted to, which is really only possible in the unicorn build now (which utilizes evade almost as much as the GW1 assassin, but not passively like it did). If thieves had been designed as the GW1 sin was, every encounter with one would be like fighting them underwater currently is, and with the addition of dodging, thieves would be almost untouchable.

As for stealth not supposed to be a tool used for deception as a mesmer uses clones for deception, shadow refuge and blinding powder would not be known as deception skills (as well as smoke wall, but you have to leap across or use a blast finisher to gain stealth from that). The first major trait in shadow arts is even called master of deception which reduces recharge on the utilities that stealth the thief.

The main reason a thief is not called an assassin now is that they broadened the just the stereotype of assassin by giving it steal (and allowed for builds that resembled other disreputable professions). Maybe ninja would have been a better name for the profession, but that’s simply quibbling over a name. The thing is that the thief is just not being played the way you think it should be played, but I think that at this point, it’s working as intended.

the guards are more dangerous than the actual players !!! ahahaha…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACOxV5CA52w

seriously if you bring the nerf bat, at least please don’t touch the PvE dungeons thief.
you may trash the thief in wvw, but i really like to join parties for fractals etc.

DanH.5879:

in case you didn’t noticed the revealed debuff is 4 seconds !
3.9s….3.8s….3.7sec……1.1sec….1.0sec…0.9sec….0.2sec….0.1sec….0 now you may cloak again.
just because culling delays that, is not our fault !!!

no one said it was your fault. Why would anyone blame a player for a known issue. The problem is it exists and therefore they should fix the problem, or adjust the revealed effect so that it actually does reveal the thief.

There are plenty of video examples of this happening with developer replies saying its because of the culling issue. I’m not making things up here, most people know about it as does the developers.

Now there is a new build out there they works of heartseeking through a smokebomb to stealth you. That’s every 6 seconds. Its called the perma stealth build and it basically means you are fighting an invisible enemy you can’t target.

Anet really needs to look into this. Its not like nearly every GW2 forum is filled with thief hate already, and for good reason to.

Thobek.1730:

Now there is a new build out there they works of heartseeking through a smokebomb to stealth you. That’s every 6 seconds. Its called the perma stealth build and it basically means you are fighting an invisible enemy you can’t target.

Anet really needs to look into this. Its not like nearly every GW2 forum is filled with thief hate already, and for good reason to.

That’s not a new build, but requires a thief to go at least 20 into acrobatics and 10 into shadow arts to maintain the initiative to do so (the combo costs 8 in total I believe, 2/3 of our total pool) effectively taking a lot of burst out of the thief. As to what you were originally commenting on, a lot if people say that thieves abuse stealth/culling and are in fact holding players accountable for a problem that they had no control over, especially if they wanted to play a certain way (not S/P or unicorn bleed). It should be understandable that thieves would be defensive about ourselves especially when we are simply using the abilities available to us.

Who said thief waste his/her initiative? When you dodge? Look how fast is the recovery of there initiative and how thief insult the enemy even thief is on the enemy lines
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3m3d45T4FZw

Maugetarr.6823:

Thobek.1730:

Now there is a new build out there they works of heartseeking through a smokebomb to stealth you. That’s every 6 seconds. Its called the perma stealth build and it basically means you are fighting an invisible enemy you can’t target.

Anet really needs to look into this. Its not like nearly every GW2 forum is filled with thief hate already, and for good reason to.

That’s not a new build, but requires a thief to go at least 20 into acrobatics and 10 into shadow arts to maintain the initiative to do so (the combo costs 8 in total I believe, 2/3 of our total pool) effectively taking a lot of burst out of the thief. As to what you were originally commenting on, a lot if people say that thieves abuse stealth/culling and are in fact holding players accountable for a problem that they had no control over, especially if they wanted to play a certain way (not S/P or unicorn bleed). It should be understandable that thieves would be defensive about ourselves especially when we are simply using the abilities available to us.

firstly, its a shame people blaming thieves for the culling issue, but I can see how annoying it is when you lose target and only get a very small window of opportunity to actually hit the thief.

As for the build I was talking about, I agree it does drop the burst of a thief. Burst has never really been that much of a problem. The main problem with that build is you can’t see or target the thief 90% of the time and while invis the thief is healing so basically he/she always sits on 100% health. I think perhaps a warrior could guess a 100 blades and get lucky. But for some class that can’t swing wildly around i.e. scepter or staff elementalists/ bow rangers/ scepter guardians you can’t do a single thing to stop your death, even running away isn’t an option with a thieves mobility.

Stealth has always been the tricky mechanic with MMO’s, not a single game I have played has got it right since it gives the player such a clear advantage when you’re invisible.

Things they should change: If a thief attacks they should be revealed on a miss as well – stop with this carebear attitude of only letting them do damage first before revealing them. If someone manages to evade a stealthed attack let them be rewarded for getting the timing right. It should go both ways. Its basic game design – reward players for doing something right.

Increase the reveal effect. A few seconds is barely enough when you mix in the thieves mobility, culling, lag. No more allowing thieves to reset fights after a few seconds. that’s rubbish.

burst damage is high but I can live with that. Allow them to attempt an opening, burst you down to low health then fight it out. None of this restealth then repeat. Thieves need to start earning their kills, they have had it on easymode for too long.

Thobek.1730:

Maugetarr.6823:

Thobek.1730:

Now there is a new build out there they works of heartseeking through a smokebomb to stealth you. That’s every 6 seconds. Its called the perma stealth build and it basically means you are fighting an invisible enemy you can’t target.

Anet really needs to look into this. Its not like nearly every GW2 forum is filled with thief hate already, and for good reason to.

That’s not a new build, but requires a thief to go at least 20 into acrobatics and 10 into shadow arts to maintain the initiative to do so (the combo costs 8 in total I believe, 2/3 of our total pool) effectively taking a lot of burst out of the thief. As to what you were originally commenting on, a lot if people say that thieves abuse stealth/culling and are in fact holding players accountable for a problem that they had no control over, especially if they wanted to play a certain way (not S/P or unicorn bleed). It should be understandable that thieves would be defensive about ourselves especially when we are simply using the abilities available to us.

firstly, its a shame people blaming thieves for the culling issue, but I can see how annoying it is when you lose target and only get a very small window of opportunity to actually hit the thief.

As for the build I was talking about, I agree it does drop the burst of a thief. Burst has never really been that much of a problem. The main problem with that build is you can’t see or target the thief 90% of the time and while invis the thief is healing so basically he/she always sits on 100% health. I think perhaps a warrior could guess a 100 blades and get lucky. But for some class that can’t swing wildly around i.e. scepter or staff elementalists/ bow rangers/ scepter guardians you can’t do a single thing to stop your death, even running away isn’t an option with a thieves mobility.

Stealth has always been the tricky mechanic with MMO’s, not a single game I have played has got it right since it gives the player such a clear advantage when you’re invisible.

Things they should change: If a thief attacks they should be revealed on a miss as well – stop with this carebear attitude of only letting them do damage first before revealing them. If someone manages to evade a stealthed attack let them be rewarded for getting the timing right. It should go both ways. Its basic game design – reward players for doing something right.

Increase the reveal effect. A few seconds is barely enough when you mix in the thieves mobility, culling, lag. No more allowing thieves to reset fights after a few seconds. that’s rubbish.

burst damage is high but I can live with that. Allow them to attempt an opening, burst you down to low health then fight it out. None of this restealth then repeat. Thieves need to start earning their kills, they have had it on easymode for too long.

You are right i dont care about there damage. What i care is there over using of stealth and even after they finish the enemy still on stealth how insult and annoyed is that?

Here’s an idea that just popped into my head. I haven’t really thought it through, but maybe it has some merits that are worth discussing:

Idea:
Thieves should not be able to hide from thieves. That is, all the stealth skills you have would not affect the ability of other thief class enemies to see you. This makes sense to me, because a thief should know exactly how to find a thief, the best places to look, and a thief is presumably already equipped with gear necessary that smoke bombs and items of that nature wouldn’t affect them (for self preservation purposes).

How this plays out:
Suddenly, when partying in PvP environments, it becomes extremely useful to have a thief in your party. Not only can they effectively take on thieves for your party, but here comes Idea 2.

Idea 2:
If a thief does a “Call target” on an enemy thief, the enemy thief’s stealth no longer works on anyone in the party. This would serve to make “Call target” a more utilized game mechanic, and it means enemy thieves would only really feel empowered in a solo situation, which fits with everything you already associate about thief lore.

Okay, so I’d love some discussion on this. Like I said, I dreamt it up in about 5 mins, so there may be some serious down sides to these ideas, but I’d love to hear them. I’d also, of course, love to hear if this is the best idea ever or how it could be expanded.

Cheers and good playing,

I.E.

you’re idea is to make stealth only visible for theifs? that will make things way unbalanced on a side note theifs usually know better how to counter stealth anyway.

tom.7468:

you’re idea is to make stealth only visible for theifs? that will make things way unbalanced on a side note theifs usually know better how to counter stealth anyway.

Yes. I’m proposing stealth would have no effect on other thieves.

I admit it would change the game balance, but that’s the point of this thread. I’m interested to hear how you think it would be less balanced than the current situation where nobody has a chance of seeing a thief with a perma-stealth build.

I really appreciate constructive criticism, but dismissing something out-of-hand without any reasoning is just frustrating.

Cheers and Good Playing,

I.E.

Let the thief have a permanent stealth. And let the Thief have a party or allie buffs that last for 15min that can see the hiding object. It will not hurt why? Because you gain a lot of benefits while you are on a permanent stealth. Let the thief trap there own class…

Irenic Eremite.1650:

tom.7468:

you’re idea is to make stealth only visible for theifs? that will make things way unbalanced on a side note theifs usually know better how to counter stealth anyway.

Yes. I’m proposing stealth would have no effect on other thieves.

I admit it would change the game balance, but that’s the point of this thread. I’m interested to hear how you think it would be less balanced than the current situation where nobody has a chance of seeing a thief with a perma-stealth build.

I really appreciate constructive criticism, but dismissing something out-of-hand without any reasoning is just frustrating.

Cheers and Good Playing,

I.E.

I don’t think your proposal is very sound. The vast majority of people who have a problem with stealth aren’t thieves. Your proposal would make it to where thieves would have a huge advantage against every other profession in wvw/pvp. People would really be crying out that thieves were OP. Plus, it would be giving thieves a huge competitive edge over all other professions that most would find unfair.

Although your idea is better than completely nerfing stealth like most suggest, I just don’t think it’s reasonable in the fact it would only affect thieves and the other professions would still complain about it, but complain even more because thieves would only be allowed to see other thieves.

Also, it would instantly wipe out any chance of a P/D thief fighting any other type of thief since P/D thieves need to stealth in order to get off their quick attack.

Lofat.2406:

Irenic Eremite.1650:

tom.7468:

you’re idea is to make stealth only visible for theifs? that will make things way unbalanced on a side note theifs usually know better how to counter stealth anyway.

Yes. I’m proposing stealth would have no effect on other thieves.

I admit it would change the game balance, but that’s the point of this thread. I’m interested to hear how you think it would be less balanced than the current situation where nobody has a chance of seeing a thief with a perma-stealth build.

I really appreciate constructive criticism, but dismissing something out-of-hand without any reasoning is just frustrating.

Cheers and Good Playing,

I.E.

I don’t think your proposal is very sound. The vast majority of people who have a problem with stealth aren’t thieves. Your proposal would make it to where thieves would have a huge advantage against every other profession in wvw/pvp. People would really be crying out that thieves were OP. Plus, it would be giving thieves a huge competitive edge over all other professions that most would find unfair.

Although your idea is better than completely nerfing stealth like most suggest, I just don’t think it’s reasonable in the fact it would only affect thieves and the other professions would still complain about it, but complain even more because thieves would only be allowed to see other thieves.

Also, it would instantly wipe out any chance of a P/D thief fighting any other type of thief since P/D thieves need to stealth in order to get off their quick attack.

This is good feedback. I must be missing something though, or not explaining something well enough.

Situation Now
No way to see or target a stealth thief.

My Proposal
Thieves can always target stealth thieves. When a thief in your party calls out a stealth thief the entire party can target the stealth thief. (i.e. not only affecting thieves) No other changes to game play.

I don’t immediately see how mitigating a play issue would result in more complaints. I’m not claiming this is a cure all, but I appreciate anyone humoring the idea and seeing if we could make it workable.

I think it’s great that as a side effect, thieves would avoid each other. How very thief like.

Please be sure you read my entire proposal and not just Tom’s condensed version.

Thanks,

I.E.

jan.9745:

Let the thief have a permanent stealth. And let the Thief have a party or allie buffs that last for 15min that can see the hiding object. It will not hurt why? Because you gain a lot of benefits while you are on a permanent stealth. Let the thief trap there own class…

Hell no. It’s bad enough as it is at the moment and you’re suggesting permanent stealth? What happens when you aren’t running with a thief in you group? Some people do not always run with the zerg in WvW.

Thobek.1730:

jan.9745:

Let the thief have a permanent stealth. And let the Thief have a party or allie buffs that last for 15min that can see the hiding object. It will not hurt why? Because you gain a lot of benefits while you are on a permanent stealth. Let the thief trap there own class…

Hell no. It’s bad enough as it is at the moment and you’re suggesting permanent stealth? What happens when you aren’t running with a thief in you group? Some people do not always run with the zerg in WvW.

Thats your problem. You have to find a white thief before you engage into battle. Let us treat the thief special. It means we need thief if we go to battle make sense right? Its like team work. If you dont have white thief in your side you die., sounds like friendship again., and if we see a die thief we are going to force to revive them a.s.a.p it means we have to protect the friendly white thief another thrill right?

jan.9745:

Thobek.1730:

jan.9745:

Let the thief have a permanent stealth. And let the Thief have a party or allie buffs that last for 15min that can see the hiding object. It will not hurt why? Because you gain a lot of benefits while you are on a permanent stealth. Let the thief trap there own class…

Hell no. It’s bad enough as it is at the moment and you’re suggesting permanent stealth? What happens when you aren’t running with a thief in you group? Some people do not always run with the zerg in WvW.

Thats your problem. You have to find a white thief before you engage into battle. Let us treat the thief special. It means we need thief if we go to battle make sense right? Its like team work. If you dont have white thief in your side you die., sounds like friendship again., and if we see a die thief we are going to force to revive them a.s.a.p it means we have to protect the friendly white thief another thrill right?

I can’t tell if this is a literary “modest proposal” or not.

There’s no way I’d find true permanent stealth palatable. However, I guess with some thief builds, this is a near reality already, but at least it takes some skill/management ability on the players part.

The class is designed around stealth get over it already. They put all (and I mean all ) or defensive traits in stealth. Unless they plan to rework the class from scratch and make us warriors I don’t see a point in all this kittening. And that is exactly what it is. Right now thief is a class is hell of a position. The community hates the class but good players realize its an easy counter. We simply don’t have the ridiculous access to buffs that every other class has so we have no true bunker. Our aoe options is relatively weak compared to other classes. Our burst is strong but our sustained isn’t anything special. Just like mesmers have clones we have stealth. that’s our gimmick and its necessary. So lets stop with the jokes.

Hers the best Idea your going to get in this entire thread. You have this skill called dodge and these other skills call CC use them no game changes necessary. Seriously l2p lots of thread and information out there if half of you spent half the time you spend complaining learning hoe to play your classes then there would be no thread like this.

For reference sake I don’t Play DD at all or PD or SP Dp at all. I am SD 100% my burst comes from auto attack half the time you can see me stealth boost my dps by a whopping 0 but I need it just to survive half the skills they give other classes. I am not invulnerable while its up the healing is pitiful but I know its necessary.

One day give a warrior a thief with equal gear and have them auto tack each other and see who dies first try it.

Laika.8795:

So your idea to balance thieves is to give them less access to stealth than a Mesmer based on a bunch of traits available that are rarely taken, and give us another spamable burst skill that can also be used by D/D? Oh, and I’m sure P/D condition builds would be thrilled to have a burst ability on their hot bar! I don’t think you understand how bad of an idea that is.

You certainly embellish the usefulness of some of the stealth traits, I think purposely, to prove a point. But I guess that’s what you have to do to get your way.

First of all, the Thief would still has more access to stealth then a Mesmer, you just have to count smoke combo and steal as well. Further more, the Mesmers stealth skills has recharge times of 30, 40, 90, and 90 seconds. While the Thieves stealth skills (not counting Cloak and Dagger, Hide in Shadows, Black Powder, or Blinding Tuft) has recharge times of 40, 30, 60, 45 (Steal), and 30 (Smoke Screen) seconds. And here’s the best part; the Mesmer stealth skills has durations of 3, 3, 3, and 5 seconds, while the Thieves stealth skills has durations of 3, 10, 5, 2 (Steal), and 10 (Smoke Screen) seconds. Second of all, just like the Mesmer, the Thief does not need stealth to be playable. Where as the Mesmer got illusions, the Thief has movement. A lot of it.

So using stealth in a combo with ‘stealth skills’ is not a burst ability? My idea would simply just replace your ‘stealth skill’ burst with another burst skill, while reducing the uptime of stealth. You would still be able to using your ‘stealth skill’ from all the other stealth options you still have. The difference is, you’d have to think about what you are doing, instead of just spamming 5, 1, 5, 1, 5, 1…

lol my topic about the Thief was moved from General Discussion, to the Thief subforum, to finally being merge with this topic that we are writing in now. So it’s pretty clear that ArenaNet has no intent of changing stealth, regardless of what I say. All I can really hope to do, is make players realize that there are more to playing a Thief, then using stealth. Everything ells is just a hopeless desire to make ArenaNet realize, the Thief is not what it was originally designed to be. But they really don’t care about it, as long as the majority is happy. And people do love their Assassins…

Maugetarr.6823:

I would like to know how you came to the conclusion that a thief is not supposed to be an assassin based on your own explanations here. The (D/D) thief highlights burst which the original assassin from GW 1 did. One of the differences though is that the 1-2-3 setup would not have translated to GW2 well. Instead, skills dependant on setup (I.e. stealth) with a 3-4 second window for burst damage was implemented. In exchange for stealth, thieves lost the great protection skills that assassins in GW1 had (see critical defenses, flashing blades, and a couple of others I forgot). As to stealth not being used as it was originally introduced, in design work across all industries your first concept is rarely your last so this really is a moot point. To further highlight that the thief is the logical progression of the GW1 assassin, they share a lot of the same GW1 ability names (see twisting fangs, shadow refuge, the trait trees, the ability to “shadowstep”, etc….). Assassins could face tank in GW1 if they wanted to, which is really only possible in the unicorn build now (which utilizes evade almost as much as the GW1 assassin, but not passively like it did). If thieves had been designed as the GW1 sin was, every encounter with one would be like fighting them underwater currently is, and with the addition of dodging, thieves would be almost untouchable.

As for stealth not supposed to be a tool used for deception as a mesmer uses clones for deception, shadow refuge and blinding powder would not be known as deception skills (as well as smoke wall, but you have to leap across or use a blast finisher to gain stealth from that). The first major trait in shadow arts is even called master of deception which reduces recharge on the utilities that stealth the thief.

The main reason a thief is not called an assassin now is that they broadened the just the stereotype of assassin by giving it steal (and allowed for builds that resembled other disreputable professions). Maybe ninja would have been a better name for the profession, but that’s simply quibbling over a name. The thing is that the thief is just not being played the way you think it should be played, but I think that at this point, it’s working as intended.

They are two different archetypes. The Assassin waits in the shadows until his target least expects it, and then he strikes in one swift move, and then runs back into the shadows. A Thief waits for the right target as well, but once he is revealed, he uses cunning and movement to get away. So basically, an Assassin is someone who strikes quickly, while being mostly unseen, and is about death and dark magic. A Thief is someone who strikes quickly, but by using movement, and is about cunning and tricks.

The Thief was made to be played around movement, but has involved into playing like an Assassin, because ArenaNet hasn’t kept stealth in check. Thief players saw a greater potential in stealth, and learned to chain stealth together into a next to permanent playstyle. Revealed was put in to stop ‘stealth skills’ from being used too rapidly, but nothing has been added to prevent stealth skills from being used in the same way. It’s a mechanic that change from being a tool to utilize movement, to now being about avoiding combat completely. Thieves have gone from having an “agile, acrobatic fighting style, which can make them hard to hit” into having an “agile, invisible fighting style, which mostly makes them impossible to hit”.

Okay, deception was not the best choice of word there. What I meant is that, unlike with the Mesmer, playing against a Thief should not be a guessing game. Stealth for the Mesmer is about deceiving opponents, like an extension of their illusions. Stealth for the Thief is about avoiding opponents, like an extension of their many movement skills. But having so much stealth, means finding the Thief feels like a guessing game. It changes the archetype of the Thief.

I totally disagree with your last paragraph. As explained above, the Thief is a thief in more ways then just using Steal. Try playing a Thief without using any stealth skills, and you’’ll see the difference. The Thief is quite playable without any use of stealth at all. Of curse, that means you have to get over the fact that you can’t escape the majority of fights. But that is what fair play feels like-

they are tolling us ! not fair…
all our traits are around stealth: blind on stealth, +2 ini on stealth, regen hp on stealth, gain might on stealth, remove condition on stealth….
removing it from thief is basically making useless ~25% of our traits…

Kasama.8941:

They are two different archetypes. The Assassin waits in the shadows until his target least expects it, and then he strikes in one swift move, and then runs back into the shadows. A Thief waits for the right target as well, but once he is revealed, he uses cunning and movement to get away. So basically, an Assassin is someone who strikes quickly, while being mostly unseen, and is about death and dark magic. A Thief is someone who strikes quickly, but by using movement, and is about cunning and tricks.

The Thief was made to be played around movement, but has involved into playing like an Assassin, because ArenaNet hasn’t kept stealth in check. Thief players saw a greater potential in stealth, and learned to chain stealth together into a next to permanent playstyle. Revealed was put in to stop ‘stealth skills’ from being used too rapidly, but nothing has been added to prevent stealth skills from being used in the same way. It’s a mechanic that change from being a tool to utilize movement, to now being about avoiding combat completely. Thieves have gone from having an “agile, acrobatic fighting style, which can make them hard to hit” into having an “agile, invisible fighting style, which mostly makes them impossible to hit”.

Okay, deception was not the best choice of word there. What I meant is that, unlike with the Mesmer, playing against a Thief should not be a guessing game. Stealth for the Mesmer is about deceiving opponents, like an extension of their illusions. Stealth for the Thief is about avoiding opponents, like an extension of their many movement skills. But having so much stealth, means finding the Thief feels like a guessing game. It changes the archetype of the Thief.

I totally disagree with your last paragraph. As explained above, the Thief is a thief in more ways then just using Steal. Try playing a Thief without using any stealth skills, and you’’ll see the difference. The Thief is quite playable without any use of stealth at all. Of curse, that means you have to get over the fact that you can’t escape the majority of fights. But that is what fair play feels like-

The thief is somewhat playable other ways without using stealth as demonstrated with D/D unicorn spec or S/P builds. Without the armor or damage mitigating/reflecting/blocking boons, stealth is necessary for other builds. Maybe I didn’t properly convey my point though in my last paragraph, but the use of the name thief was an inclusive name to expand the archetype past a simple assassin to include other playstyles beyond the standard definition of assassin to include brigands, bandits, mauraders, pirates, rouges, assassins, desparados, butchers, guerillas or any other disreputable character. The thief title was used as one of inclusion. All of these can be represented in different playstyles and weapon sets available to the thief. In fact the only weapon they didn’t include that would have rounded out the class in terms of fluff/lore is a rifle which would have allowed for a hitman/bounty hunter/sniper feel as well. It is possible to play the thief simply around movement, but that is not the only way it was meant to be played.

As to guessing games, playing against a good mesmer (one who stands there auto attacking until they see you have committed to a clone) is just as much a guessing game as determining where a thief will pop out of stealth next.

Look at it this way, each trait tree show a different type of thief you can be (or any combination of 2 rather). There are deadly thieves who better fit the definition of assassins. They hit hard and melt away into the shadows after killing someone with a backstab. There are agile thieves who rely on on their physical prowess to dodge through the enemy crowds in spectacular fasion like a 40k harlequin. Then you have those that teleport from target to target and fade in and out of stealth making a combat scene reminiscent of nightcrawler. Thieves should not be pigeonholed into one particular role that you feel fits the definition better than another. The devs said in their latest live cast that there were professions that had a lot of different ways that they could be played (I took this to be thieves, warriors guardians, mesmers, and to some extent eles) but there were others that only had 1 or 2 competitive builds (necro, engineer, and ranger) so they were going to try to bring these up to par rather than bringing the others down.

DanH.5879:

they are tolling us ! not fair…
all our traits are around stealth: blind on stealth, +2 ini on stealth, regen hp on stealth, gain might on stealth, remove condition on stealth….
removing it from thief is basically making useless ~25% of our traits…

Lol we are not “tolling you” (trolling) thats why its better you have the perma stealth forever. And we are pretending that a thief is ghost. But we are asking for a friendly thief if they can give us his bufs to see the hiding object. And then everytime we engage to the battle we need to ask the white thief to bufs us… Actually in this case we treat you a lot special not “tolling”

TheGuy.3568:

The class is designed around stealth get over it already. They put all (and I mean all ) or defensive traits in stealth. Unless they plan to rework the class from scratch and make us warriors I don’t see a point in all this kittening. And that is exactly what it is. Right now thief is a class is hell of a position. The community hates the class but good players realize its an easy counter. We simply don’t have the ridiculous access to buffs that every other class has so we have no true bunker. Our aoe options is relatively weak compared to other classes. Our burst is strong but our sustained isn’t anything special. Just like mesmers have clones we have stealth. that’s our gimmick and its necessary. So lets stop with the jokes.

Hers the best Idea your going to get in this entire thread. You have this skill called dodge and these other skills call CC use them no game changes necessary. Seriously l2p lots of thread and information out there if half of you spent half the time you spend complaining learning hoe to play your classes then there would be no thread like this.

For reference sake I don’t Play DD at all or PD or SP Dp at all. I am SD 100% my burst comes from auto attack half the time you can see me stealth boost my dps by a whopping 0 but I need it just to survive half the skills they give other classes. I am not invulnerable while its up the healing is pitiful but I know its necessary.

One day give a warrior a thief with equal gear and have them auto tack each other and see who dies first try it.

This guy need “L2POB” learn to play other build., lol your asking to give a warrior and thief equal gear and let them auto attack sounds like you are out of your mind. You cant tell the thing if balance or not if you just let them auto attack an see who die first

So if you have a “white thief” in your group that gives you buffs, you’re basically immune to any other opposing thief with your idea. So you suggest having a thief in your group to be able to see a thief 100% of the time which would basically give you super powers over all enemy thieves. I would propose a major damage reduction or an increase in the damage you take if you have this buff active. After all, if you want to see us, there has to be some risk involved.

In all reality, your proposal would nerf thieves to the ground as our stealth would be useless. It would eliminate backstabs and sneak attacks, not to mention give us no defensive skills. The Shadow Arts tree would have to be completely reworked to account for your proposal, and the bottom line is that it’s completely unrealistic. I’m all for hearing people out, but this isn’t a fix, it’s a gigantic advantage for everyone else and turns thieves into a useless class.