Guild Wars 2

Kasama.8941:

I wrote this topic because I recognize that stealth for the Thief is currently imbalanced, and I think it’s important to speak up about it, because everyone in the game seem to be complaining, yet no one really writes about it on the forums where ArenaNet can read it.

Are you serious? No one writes about it on the forums?

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Stealth-to-Shadow-Form
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Thoughts-Burning-as-a-stealth-counter
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Stealth-suggestion-More-but-Less
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Overpowered-Thieves
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Cloack-Dagger
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/How-to-fix-the-stealth-issue
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Counter
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/A-single-fix-that-would-help-balance-stealth

And of course the massive 43 page whingefest:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/The-thief-and-its-gameplay-Your-feedback

Pretty much lost all credibility when you advised building a thief around not using stealth. Clearly you have not played a thief in WvW and as such has no idea what the pitfalls of this class currently are. Just another forum post from someone who thinks they are an expert on something they have no real idea about. We can close this thread now.

Kasama.8941:

Here’s a Thief playing without stealth. I think he’s doing pretty well, and the fights actually looks fair and fun. Also notice how he actually have to use all his skills to be effective.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-F9E54gxN6Y

He doesn’t use C&D because he’s centered around condition damage. Using C&D would have no advantage for him. He’s not traited into getting a massive backstab and the vulnerability won’t add dmg to the bleeding.
He spams Death blossom ’till the initiatives are up and then uses auto-attack. So he starts a fight with stacking 12 bleeding on the foe, and then just bashes him.
His utilities are for immobilizing and for closing a gap. Healing skill and third utility is for an extra dodge when his 3# is used and has no dodges left.

I’m a stealth oriented thief, and I actually use every skill I have, both sets.
C&D, flanking strike, infiltrator’s strike, 1# attack. Enemy runs away? Dancing dagger or switching to my bow to keep pressure up.
Stealthing utility and healing, gap closing shadowstep with condition removal. Infiltrator’s signet as stunbreaker. Elite skill in case things doesn’t go as planned (extra support while I wait for an opening)

oZii.2864:

Kasama.8941:

Here’s a Thief playing without stealth. I think he’s doing pretty well, and the fights actually looks fair and fun. Also notice how he actually have to use all his skills to be effective.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-F9E54gxN6Y

Seriously? The first 3 minutes of the video in all but 1 engagement he pops thieves guild everytime.

…and that was back in beta, before all the nerfs…

magicthighs.5372:

Are you serious? No one writes about it on the forums?

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Stealth-to-Shadow-Form
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Thoughts-Burning-as-a-stealth-counter
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Stealth-suggestion-More-but-Less
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Overpowered-Thieves
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Cloack-Dagger
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/How-to-fix-the-stealth-issue
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Counter
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/A-single-fix-that-would-help-balance-stealth

And of course the massive 43 page whine fest:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/The-thief-and-its-gameplay-Your-feedback

Best part about this, is the fact that all I see IN GAME is completely opposite of what I see in the forums. I see complaints about how pathetic the thief is IN GAME, and then I come to the forums, and I see the qq fest, and it makes me giggle, followed by face palming.

I`d like to apologize if i sound bitter but after all that`s been done to this class i doubt any constructive input would be heard let alone implemented. After 30 mins of reading through this thread i have noticed that “nerf the thieves cuz they hide too much!!11!” posts are dangerously close to those that offer pertinent info on what is “bad broken”. I see thieves have been improved alright: they`ve taken the cannon out of glass cannon.

1)After all requiring 2-3 stealths to chain a couple of backstabs that do half the damage a warrior would do in one skill is perfect.

2)Having enough initiative to do anything other than auto-attacks (lolkitten damage compared to other classes btw) and yes! spamming heartseeker (we do it cause we don`t have anything left) was op.

3)Venom that doesn`t dissipate when u hit the air, even though no enemy is targeted nor in the vecinity, is op. Not to mention warriors, guardians have one button block which makes this build lulzy to say the least. I mean it`s a one hit ultimate for god`s sake and u block it? Should be dodge ONLY.

4)Base hp above a kitchen roach would be op.

5)Having utilities that don`t either fall in the category of “blanket over your head” or “suicide charge” would be too varied, useful and thus OP.

6)Having schools of traits that put together incompatible elements like venom based hp leeching in stealth instead of deadly arts, guaranteed critical hit from stealth in critical school, increased dmg from the back in trickery instead of deadly/crit, toughness nowhere near hp, same for power and crit etc etc is just right.

7)Having cloak and dagger with less cast time and higher range or better yet without cast time would offend the sensibilities of those that make “thieves hide too much !!11!” posts.

8)Death blossom that doesn`t jerk u uncontrollably, like in a violent car crash, in directions that are counterproductive rather than helpful is again very useful for my daily dose of sPVP.

9)Having SOME invulnerabilities or hell at least one would be op. Meanwhile an elementalist has that plus the block thingy attributed to the element of earth on top of aoes, knockback and dmg that would make Godzilla weep. Yet we are op. Oh yeah necromancers popping deathshroud and dealing terrible conditions while standing still are just as balanced. Thieves are bad though…

List continues. At this point i`m not even mad about the money spent even though if i wanted basically the exact same level of unfairness and bias i would have stuck with Aion, FOR FREE. True it doesn`t have a monthly subscription and the B2P with in game shop is much better IMO since you are not forced to play monthly or waste money if you don`t, but that doesn`t make it right to upset the profession balance. Not so the majority, most of the times utterly ignorant, feel safe and cozy with their one button win profession. I mean we bought the game already, stop pitching the sale!
The saddest part of all is i leveled a thief for the sake of immersion if nothing else, since the structured pvp (in name only) is like a separate minigame and ZergVzergVzerg doesn`t count as pvp…There is only so much “teamwork” even the greatest carebear can stomach before they get annoyed/bored.
TL:DR fail thief is mad cuz he`s bad.

Yea agree with above as players are getting better more people are learning how to counter thieves in game. I use refuge and a necro or warrior or mesmer is knocking me out of it now. Now that people are starting to learn to play against thieves the glaring weaknesses in the class are becoming more pronounced.

I get random party invites from gc thieves from the enemy side asking me about p/d since gc is getting countered even harder these days.

Rayya.2591:

I will define thieves stealth for you OP:
Stealth is the ability that allow to an class with 10k hp and 2000 armor to win vs an shatter mesmer that do 20k damage in an single combo.

No. A stealthed player takes damage. A good mesmer can blow up a gc thief easily.

Stealth is the ability that allow to an class with 10k hp and 2000 armor to win vs an warrior that can do over 25k damage with 1 combo, while they CC you.

No. A stealthed player taked damage. A good warrior can HB a gc thief even if can’t see him.

However i do not belive A-net intended to make from stealth the most powerfull survaivability mechanism, that became in wvwvw, mostly caused by constant C&D on monsters, and on pets / low lvl players that do not know how to counter it.

Thieves learned how to use stealth … someone learned how to counter stealth, someone else didn’t and complains about it.

Dual.8953:

Kasama: Did you try all the weapon sets before the change? I’m curious how S/D and P/D operated back then, because now they require frequent access to stealth to be effective. Especially since the dagger OH nerf.

I didn’t feel that Sword+Dagger dealt enough damage back then to be viable, so I didn’t use it after trying it out. I played a lot with Pistol+Dagger, though. I mostly played a roamer/revive build, that mainly used Haste and Blinding Powder as a revive mechanic. In combat I used Shadow Strike, Withdraw, Signet of Shadows, and the Acrobatics trait line for movement. Haste, Blinding Powder, and Cloak and Dagger was used to maximize damage.

ZLE.8293:

@Kasama,you are beginning to net yourself in your own inability to justify your point.
Look at your own video(that you presented for example). Isn’t that Cloak&Dagger?
Right there at #5……PLUS the other Stealths.You are embarrassing yourself.

You misunderstood me. I meant “the way Claok and Dagger is used today says it all”. Yes, Cloak and Dagger was availible at that time as well, but it wasn’t in anyway used/spammed as it is today. The Thief was a movement oriented profession, so it really didn’t occur to players that they could spam Cloak and Dagger. When it comes to stealth, people relied on utility skills a lot more. You can also see in the video (which is from beta weekend 3) that he barely touches Claok and Dagger, even though he could just spam it and rely in his #1 dagger skill, exactly like Thieves do today. Come to think about it, I can’t even remember the last time I played against a Thief who used Death Blossom. It’s always 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 5, change position, repeat.

oZii.2864:

Seriously? The first 3 minutes of the video in all but 1 engagement he pops thieves guild everytime.

Yes, as mentioned; notice how he has to use all his skills. When I play with my Mesmer, I use my elite all the time. The fact that the stealth Thief barely has to touch his utilities, let alone his elite skill, really speaks volumes to how powerful stealth is.

Rayya.2591:

I will define thieves stealth for you OP:
Stealth is the ability that allow to an class with 10k hp and 2000 armor to win vs an shatter mesmer that do 20k damage in an single combo.
Stealth is the ability that allow to an class with 10k hp and 2000 armor to win vs an warrior that can do over 25k damage with 1 combo, while they CC you.
However i do not belive A-net intended to make from stealth the most powerfull survaivability mechanism, that became in wvwvw, mostly caused by constant C&D on monsters, and on pets / low lvl players that do not know how to counter it.

Yes, exactly. The Thief can survive situations where other professions would normally die. You think other professions survive 20k combos?

magicthighs.5372:

Are you serious? No one writes about it on the forums?

(a lot of links)

And of course the massive 43 page whingefest:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/The-thief-and-its-gameplay-Your-feedback

Well then I guess stealth for the Thief isn’t a problem after all. I mean, clearly not a lot of players think it is an issue..

Gwalchgwn.1659:

He doesn’t use C&D because he’s centered around condition damage. Using C&D would have no advantage for him. He’s not traited into getting a massive backstab and the vulnerability won’t add dmg to the bleeding.
He spams Death blossom ’till the initiatives are up and then uses auto-attack. So he starts a fight with stacking 12 bleeding on the foe, and then just bashes him.
His utilities are for immobilizing and for closing a gap. Healing skill and third utility is for an extra dodge when his 3# is used and has no dodges left.

I’m a stealth oriented thief, and I actually use every skill I have, both sets.
C&D, flanking strike, infiltrator’s strike, 1# attack. Enemy runs away? Dancing dagger or switching to my bow to keep pressure up.
Stealthing utility and healing, gap closing shadowstep with condition removal. Infiltrator’s signet as stunbreaker. Elite skill in case things doesn’t go as planned (extra support while I wait for an opening)

It’s not about offense, it’s about defense. Using movement as a defense alone is perfetly viable, as the video shows. And as meantioned ealier, I’m not saying the Thief shouldn’t have any stealth skills at all, just that it should be balanced to play against. So imagine doing what the player in the video does, while also having two or three stealth skills on your utility bar that you can use.

Kasama.8941:

I can’t even remember the last time I played against a Thief who used Death Blossom. It’s always 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 5, change position, repeat.

Every single match in spvp I see DB thiefs …

Kasama.8941:

Yes, exactly. The Thief can survive situations where other professions would normally die. You think other professions survive 20k combos?

Yes, they do. Frequently. Reason being they have the health pools and armor to do so. Thieves do not, we have stealth. My Necro can take a 20k and still survive. If my Thief gets hit for 20k he’s dead by about 6-7k damage.

How is movement alone viable again? When I try to move and dodge I get pummeled to death very quickly by the the endless volley of AoE and projectiles being thrown at me. Thieves can’t infinitely dodge (I wish) and even if we could there wouldn’t be enough time to do any meaningful damage to a target since if we get hit at all our health is almost gone. Thieves have the lowest health pool in the game…ranged classes have more health (which is down right silly). We don’t have the mitigation, health, or blocks that the big dogs have so we have to survive some how, because despite popular belief people who play thieves are real people too and deserve some sort of chance to be viable in the role that they were given.

Kasama.8941:

This is what was said about stealth for the Thief, when it was first revealed:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWm8dTrEyWM

(watch from 2:50 to 3:21)

Interview (http://kotaku.com/5780900/the-guild-wars-2-thief-is-a-rogue-like-none-other):
“Stealth in Guild Wars 2 runs on a timer, which would allow you a few precious seconds of Initiative recharge before the enemy uncovers you again.

The wise Thief player will know when to retreat and recharge."

“Players are used to going toe-to-toe with monsters, and the Thief is built around hopping in-and-out of combat. If you don’t know when to back off, you’re going to die.”

Here’s the description of stealth from wiki:
“Stealth — Thieves have access to multiple skills which, for a short duration, make them invisible to enemy players and avoid aggro of hostile NPCs. While stealthed the thief is not targettable, but can still be damaged by attacks which hit them, and attacking from stealth will break the deception.”

And from the 14th december update notes:
“Thieves are the masters of mobility, stealth and high single target damage. They can be very fragile if you counter their stealth with area of effects or large stacks of conditions, but they trade this fragility in order to have some of the highest burst damage in the game. They are able to help allies through traps, venoms and the mobility to flank most encounters.”

---

Now look at these resent videos I picked randomly from YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9grDRzNT_wg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4m2mGDUL38
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7OYniHrGqE

The thing to notice about these videos isn’t only that the Thief is able to have stealth up for what seems to be next to permanently, but also how easily the Thief is able to escape once low on health. That shadow stepping makes the Thief able to easily escape AoE attacks and snares. That with Cloak and Dagger the Thief can keep stealth up without any lose to playstyle, thanks to the fast recharge of initiative. That “Revealed” is not a hinderance for the Thief at all, because the three seconds that the Thief can’t stealth, is the time that’s spend on attacking anyway. That the Thief don’t have to use their utilities for anything, other then gaining more stealth. And that on top of all of this, the Thief can also use skills like Dagger Storm to avoid damage, or Thieves Guild as pseudo clones for distraction.

This is how the majority of Thieves play: Stealth to get the upper hand and maximum damage on first attack, attack for three seconds until Revealed has passed, gain stealth again to regain positioning on your foe, attacking him again when he’s got his back turned, keep attacking him as he tries to run away with 20% health left, alternatively use shadow stepping or cripple to stop him from escaping, stealth again when he’s downed so he or an ally can’t stop you from stomping him, and then stealth/shadow step away, or start attacking the ally who was trying to help the foe you just stomped. If three or more players finally do manage to get you down to low health; use shadow stepping/Dagger Storm/Thieves Guild to get away, go back into stealth to make your foes lose track of you, hide until your health is restored, proceed to attacking again.

---

Am I the only one who can see the contradictory between how ArenaNet wants the Thief to play, and how it is actually played? I’m not sure how anyone (other then a Thief maybe) can justify stealth, for the Thief, as being balanced. I mean, how are you suppose to fight a profession that you can’t see for 80% of a fight, and who can easily escape you during the 20% window where you actually do see him? How is this fun to play against?

Please do explain to me how much does a 1v1 fight affects in WvW? or how useful a thief is when he needs more than 12min to kill a target? I’m sorry I only see 1v1 complains here nothing related to actual game unbalance, all those videos are terrible examples :/

My main is ele and my secondary is Thief, tbh i really love thief althogh i still have to master it, i’m running a full berserk gear couse i want to be deadly but i’m also very very weak in armor and healt ofc. I just wanted to point out that i love to use deception skills that are the most strong in my opinion but i have some concerns about traps. They feel kinda weak and hard to use with a very mobile class that never stops moving, i like sigils altough there are not enough traits for them imo. Venoms looks unusable or too weak to be dunno why i reading the effects i don’t see any good reason to use them.
Caltrops is the most useless utility to me since the primary trait cam make them spawn on dodge although they are more weak that the one with the utility.
Personally i like thief but i never tried it on a more balanced gear, i feel that the damage will decrease too much while the defence will be poor anyway but that’s just a feeling i never tried it i just can compare that with my eles that has both a balanced set (p, t+v) and a more dmg oriented one.

Just a thing imho the only really cool armor for thief is tier 3 human, is that really necessary to have those armor for that much money? i mean they are rares not even exotics, for that price should be at least exo! :P

Thanks

EDIT: I forgot the most important thing, pls give thief more ways to remove conditions!!

The only real problem I have with stealth is the heal in stealth Mechanic. Since aoe is suppose to be the counter. When a single person AOEing an area is really not a threat because of the healing, something is wrong with the ‘counter’. And you add in an as of yet undefined AOE nerf, it might get much easier for thieves.

Well and culling. But that goes without saying.

Wryscher.1432:

The only real problem I have with stealth is the heal in stealth Mechanic. Since aoe is suppose to be the counter. When a single person AOEing an area is really not a threat because of the healing, something is wrong with the ‘counter’. And you add in an as of yet undefined AOE nerf, it might get much easier for thieves.

Well and culling. But that goes without saying.

Thief laugh in your face on the forum for using aoe… We laugh at you in hopes you don’t use aoe b/c you think it is useless.

Thief are scared as hell of aoe while in game.

Wryscher.1432:

The only real problem I have with stealth is the heal in stealth Mechanic. Since aoe is suppose to be the counter. When a single person AOEing an area is really not a threat because of the healing, something is wrong with the ‘counter’. And you add in an as of yet undefined AOE nerf, it might get much easier for thieves.

Well and culling. But that goes without saying.

Oh, you mean a survival built thief is not as easy to kill? You mean like the invincible (almost) bunker builds on other classes? Do go on…tell me more.

Kurow.6973:

Oh, you mean a survival built thief is not as easy to kill? You mean like the invincible (almost) bunker builds on other classes? Do go on…tell me more.

Well, after all the thief invested only 50 points in healing/toughness/vitality trait lines…
He must die like a…well like a thief.Not like some other classes that if speced like that can drag 4 ppl on top of them and don’t die.

Kasama.8941:

ZLE.8293:

@Kasama,what you see from 2:50 to 3:21 is the old “Hide in Shadows”. Originally it was designed as long Stealth skill and later changed to what is now:Heal+short Stealth.Also there was an elite skill,that was basically ability that allow you to attack for several seconds w/o being revealed.So if you think now Thief is more powerful that was originally intended,you are terribly wrong.You took time and put a lot of effort to write this topic…I suggest invest this time in practice of avoiding particular melee skill with cast time(^%$#cough Compact Disc cough%^$#) and you will laugh at the P/D and S/D thieves in no time.Furthermore you can equip reliable Stunbreaker and you will laugh D/D and S/P burst thieves as well.

Yeah, I know. I’ve been following Guild Wars 2 since before the first profession was revealed, so I know the process the Thief has been trough. That is why I made this topic, because I can remember how the Thief played in beta weekends, and when the game was first released. Back then, the Thief relied on movement, while using stealth as a tool to make movement more effective. It was actually a lot of fun to play against back then, and that’s how I wish the Thief would play today as well.

It is a lot more powerful now then it was back then. The design was originally to have stealth last around 30 seconds, but then give the Thief less stealth skills. But that design was change in order to spread stealth out over more abilities.The problem is that players have taken advantage of this, and are now able to string stealth together into an almost endless chain. So we went from two or three long lasting stealth skills, to well…basically Cloak and Dagger says it all.

I do avoid Thieves all the time, the problem is that they are next to impossible to kill. Don’t assume that I wrote this topic because I die to Thieves all the time. I wrote this topic because I recognize that stealth for the Thief is currently imbalanced, and I think it’s important to speak up about it, because everyone in the game seem to be complaining, yet no one really writes about it on the forums where ArenaNet can read it. The stealth design for the Thief needs to be pulled back to what it use to be, back when it was actually fun to play against.

Hepan.2709:

Ever played d/d ele? Much better mobility the thief, without sacrificing their class mech to cover distance (HS, IA, IS), playing thief without stealth is pretty much a death sentence, even bunker built we have no means to block, go invoul or other ways to completely negate damage. Hell we dont even do that in stealth, so spamming random 1 attacks on melee actually nets results more often then you think you just dont see it.

Escaping combat is not an issue, class design is. Some classes have mobility, some classes have OP heals, some have both, some have nothing. So stop crying nerf this, nerf that cause you rolled a badly designed class and ask for bug fixes/buffs for your class.
I have a necro, engi and thief currently 80 full gear. Thief in WvWvW is better in 90% of the situations atm because those other classed lack what thiefs have. Namely gap closers and/or escape mechanichs.

TL,DR: hate the game, not the players

Here’s a Thief playing without stealth. I think he’s doing pretty well, and the fights actually looks fair and fun. Also notice how he actually have to use all his skills to be effective.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-F9E54gxN6Y

You serious ? thief in your video uses 1 single skill which is deathblossom.

Kasama.8941:

magicthighs.5372:

Are you serious? No one writes about it on the forums?

(a lot of links)

And of course the massive 43 page whingefest:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/The-thief-and-its-gameplay-Your-feedback

Well then I guess stealth for the Thief isn’t a problem after all.

Your claim was that nobody writes about it on the forums, remember? And that’s why you decided to start this thread, instead of adding your feedback to the 43 page thread that was right there, on the front page of the thief forums, at the time you posted yours.

I mean, clearly not a lot of players think it is an issue..

What, the issue of it being “no fun” to play against thieves? That it’s “not fair” that they can decide to disengage? Yeah, those are some pretty strong points, seriously.

while personally do not share the opinion,
and doing just fine on fractals 30+;

there has been lots of ‘no thieves’ in lfg sites lately,
in hi-lvl dungeons / fractals. mostly because they are saying
thieves lack ‘group support’ and overall party contribution.

are there any planned updates on the class’ state in pve?
outside SR, walls, combo blast finishing; there really is a
bias against them when grouping in fractals lately

The thief needs more access to non-stealth playstyles, or more access to stealth on some weapons.

Thieves need more “Fury”, “Swiftness.” boons, I think thieves should be extremely mobile, but currently we have some of the worst boons.

Most of our boons are bursty, making it so we are “one hit wonders” which pigeonhole us into certain builds, we also have little to no group support, and give our group a lot less might then other classes do.

Thieves honestly need more access to “fury” much like what they did to warrior, lowering the internal cooldown on our “When target is under 50%, gain fury.” Fury should be increased to 20 seconds, and the internal cool-down 40 seconds.

Thieves also have no access to sword traits, unlike all the other classes, we should gain bonuses to damage and critical for using non-daggers, and even more for using pistols, if they redid our traits to be better, heres what I would do.

Pistol Mastery – If thieves are using a pistol in there offhand, gain 10% damage.
Dagger Mastery – If thieves are using a dagger in there offhand, gain 5% damage.

This would make the traits much better for thieves, also we could do this as well.

Combo Critical Chance – After using a dual skill, gain “fury.” for 10 seconds.

Combined Training – After using a dual skill, gain 5 stacks of “might.” for 10 seconds.

This makes the traits do more then just improve the damage of “ONE” ability, and gives thieves access to more boons.

None of the above changes would effect thieves burst, most of those traits already have 100% critical chance, but 5 stacks of might would help power AND condition damage players, which they IMO need.

Non-burst damage thieves have needed love since beta, and so do venom thieves.

I would love to have a viable build to fight on the capture point with. Its so stupid fighting someone for 2 mins and win but lose like 30 points for your team because they have it captured the entire time your fighting. Thief is great fun but anything other than going full berserk feels like you become a stealth res bot who cant cap points alone.

All of the reasons given by the OP assume the person(s) facing the thief does not understand the game mechanics and is easily fulled. Stealth is fine. Every profession has an ability (or many abilities) that gives them a long period of survivability or removes them from combat. Stealth’s purpose is to give thieves a breather so they can actually do something. Try playing a roaming thief without stealth. I dare you.

PS
S/P doesn’t count. :P

Harbinger.9645:

Yes, they do. Frequently. Reason being they have the health pools and armor to do so. Thieves do not, we have stealth. My Necro can take a 20k and still survive. If my Thief gets hit for 20k he’s dead by about 6-7k damage.

How is movement alone viable again? When I try to move and dodge I get pummeled to death very quickly by the the endless volley of AoE and projectiles being thrown at me. Thieves can’t infinitely dodge (I wish) and even if we could there wouldn’t be enough time to do any meaningful damage to a target since if we get hit at all our health is almost gone. Thieves have the lowest health pool in the game…ranged classes have more health (which is down right silly). We don’t have the mitigation, health, or blocks that the big dogs have so we have to survive some how, because despite popular belief people who play thieves are real people too and deserve some sort of chance to be viable in the role that they were given.

Not being able to survive encounters because your vitality is low, doesn’t mean that you should have next to permanent stealth. It means that you should rebalance your stats, so you get more vitality. Again; just like every other profession does.

As a Thief, you can also get swiftness on dodging, plus insanely fast endurance regeneration, just by going 15 trait points into Acrobatics. Next to that you can also get might, remove cripple/weakness, and leave caltrops, on dodging. But let me put it into perspective for you: You have shadow stepping; Steal, Infiltrator’s Arrow, Infiltrator’s Strike/Shadow Return, Shadow Shot, Shadow Strike, Shadowstep/Shadow Return, Infiltrator’s Signet, and Shadow Trap. Then you have movement skills; Disabling Shot, Heartseeker, Flanking Strike, Death Blossom, Withdraw, and Roll for Initiative. You also have snare/control skills; Dancing Dagger, Black Powder, Smoke Screen, Signet of Shadows, Needle Trap, Tripwire, Caltrops, Devourer Venom, Ice Drake Venom, and Basilisk Venom. And finally, you have two endurance gaining skills; Wild Strike and Signet of Agility. Oh, and then of curse there’s all your trait skills; Panic Strike, Ankle Shots, Expeditious Dodger, Feline Grace, Vigorous Recovery, Assassin’s Retreat, Fleet of Foot, Hard to Catch, Instinctual Response, Uncatchable, Thrill of the Crime, and Bountiful Theft.

^And on top of all this stuff, you still have stealth!

Art.9820:

Please do explain to me how much does a 1v1 fight affects in WvW? or how useful a thief is when he needs more than 12min to kill a target? I’m sorry I only see 1v1 complains here nothing related to actual game unbalance, all those videos are terrible examples :/

It has to do with the enjoyment of the combat, not how it affects the overall result of WvW.

But it is not only a 1v1 issue. Yesterday, after the servers had reset in WvW, I was going to sm to hide, so I could portal allies inside in case we lost it. But on my way to find an open door, I ran into four allies who were trying to kill two Thieves, so I thought I’d join in to help out. About three minutes later, the four of us were defeated, and the last guy was running away (he didn’t make it very far). We only managed to down one of the Thieves once during the fight, but of curse, the other Thief just put stealth on them both, and revived the downed Thief. It was easy for them. Later that evening, I ran by four allies chasing a player, so I just kept going thinking that they would get him. But then I saw it was a Thief, and decided to watch. It literally took four players over two minutes to defeat that one Thief. And he wasn’t even a good player! It was only because he decided to stick around he got defeated. He could have run away at any time.

skupuz.6940:

Thief laugh in your face on the forum for using aoe… We laugh at you in hopes you don’t use aoe b/c you think it is useless.

Thief are scared as hell of aoe while in game.

This isn’t my experience at all. The videos in my original post also shows how easily a Thief is able to just dodge or shadow step away from an AoE area. I know when playing how easy it is for me to dodge out of AoE, and I only have one teleport skill on my staff. So how is it harder for a Thief who has superior movement skills to other professions? Even traits alone gives benefits that removes any real effect AoE skills or conditions could have. Slowed Pulse gives regeneration when you have 5+ stacks of bleeding, Shadow’s Embrace removes a condition every 3 second you are in stealth, Cloaked in Shadow gives blind to nearby foes when you go into stealth, Shadow’s Rejuvenation gives you regeneration whenever you are in stealth, Pain Response gives you regeneration and removes conditions when you are at 75% health, Hard to Catch shadow steps you away and gives you swiftness when you are disabled. Your healing skill Hide in Shadows removes burning, poison, and bleeding, next to the stealth it gives you! And if all things fail, the Thief can still just stealth and run away from a fight.

Karolis.4261:

You serious ? thief in your video uses 1 single skill which is deathblossom.

That’s the whole point if initiative. It makes the Thief able to use the same skill multiple times, in order to deal more dps. He is still using all his other skills, including his shortbow.

magicthighs.5372:

Your claim was that nobody writes about it on the forums, remember? And that’s why you decided to start this thread, instead of adding your feedback to the 43 page thread that was right there, on the front page of the thief forums, at the time you posted yours.

What, the issue of it being “no fun” to play against thieves? That it’s “not fair” that they can decide to disengage? Yeah, those are some pretty strong points, seriously.

The point of this topic is to highlight the difference between how the Thief originally played like, and what it has turned into. Most players who play a Thief today, really believe that stealth is suppose to be the bread and butter of what the Thief does. But the truth is, that stealth was always suppose to be a tool to utilize movement. And movement is what the Thief excels at.

The issue is that it’s imbalanced. The fact that it isn’t fun to play against, is a result of that. The Thief is perfectly capable of disengaging combat, without having to rely on next to permanent stealth.

Geewoody.2017:

All of the reasons given by the OP assume the person(s) facing the thief does not understand the game mechanics and is easily fulled. Stealth is fine. Every profession has an ability (or many abilities) that gives them a long period of survivability or removes them from combat. Stealth’s purpose is to give thieves a breather so they can actually do something. Try playing a roaming thief without stealth. I dare you.

PS
S/P doesn’t count. :P

That’s a nice way of putting it. I like to say; any knowledge on stealth is futile, as the point of the matter is you don’t know where the Thief is, and you have a limited amount of AoE skills to use. Knowledge of stealth doesn’t make the Thief visible. I can understand that stealth feels balanced in an environment like sPvP, because combat there is concentrated around a center point, thereby giving you a clue as to where the Thief is located. However, if you are playing in WvW, where there is no walls or area that limits movement, it becomes glaringly obvious how powerful stealth for the Thief is.

As said many times; I’m not suggesting that the Thief shouldn’t have any stealth at all, just that it should be balanced. You do not need next to permanent stealth in order to play as a roamer Thief. You really only need the stealth to get past foes you run into. And you still have other skills besides stealth that can help you.

Yes a thief can engage in combat and disengage at will thats what superior mobility will do for you. If you removed stealth or whatever is your aim is. What would the results be for thief? Nobody would probably play it would be 1 cause they would die all the time pve and wvw.

Imagine if the thief had no stealth at all. How would the thief kill/engage people? Thief has no access to invul/complete mitigation really stealth is the defense. People spec into the shadow arts tree for the traits (see how they revolve around stealth) nobody specs there for the toughness because you can’t get enough toughness to make you really tanky. Then your still pretty much a single target.

Go grab a thief put on all invaders p/v/t gear and try to go kill something with any of the weapon sets and try to do so by not going into stealth. That is what it would be like if thief didn’t have stealth and you would be saying how am I suppose to kill someone.

Also you talk about mobility if thieves didnt have stealth you would pretty much force everyone to run shortbow so they can get away in wvw. SoS doesn’t just allow you to walk away from people..

have to make another post because I guess its on another page.

I read that your not saying that a thief shouldn’t have access to stealth and that your saying that it should be balanced.

Basically what I am saying is that if you say for instance took away cnd thieves would pretty much never be played at all.

You would have to change the entire class it wouldn’t be attractive to anyone and those that did play it would be pretty gimped. You would have to increase the base HP pool of the thief and change skills around an entire rework.

Next time your in wvw and say you run into a group of 5-10 players and your with a group of 5-10 players just watch what the thief does.

He will sit back find a target attack it try to get a kill and go back behind the front lines. He isn’t in the mix swing away etc if he is he is probably going to die or he has shadow step up to get out and then what its on a 60 sec cd. and he is back behind the front lines.

The only problem I have with the stealth currently is name plates not coming back after the thief comes out of stealth for several seconds. Its the only real problem I have with stealth. Its more abusive and apparent in thick fights, I can deal massive damage to large groups of players without them realizing I am there lot of the time. Some thieves have taken to dressing up as the thieves in thieves guild to trick people because its almost impossible to tell which one is the real thieve until they get a good 2 or 3 hits in.

The most successful thieves I have seen so far are human thieves of medium to small size since if you dress up closely to your thieves in thieves guild you will fool a lot of people often. If name plates popped up right when you came out of stealth then there would be less confusion.

Thieves are annoying and downright hard to kill if played right and I like that. But the name plate issue I have is definitely making human thieves the better choice for confusing players.

oZii.2864:

Basically what I am saying is that if you say for instance took away cnd thieves would pretty much never be played at all.

If a single skill on a single weapon would make or break a class, that skill is OP.

oZii.2864:

You would have to change the entire class it wouldn’t be attractive to anyone and those that did play it would be pretty gimped. You would have to increase the base HP pool of the thief and change skills around an entire rework.

If you would quit the class over a nerf of a singe OP skill you are just a bandwagoner.

I’ve been playing on my thief since launch. I never enjoyed dagger off-hand and played sword/pistol most of the time using only Shadow Refuge or Blinding Powder for stealth.

So far I don’t feel gimped when playing my thief.

You might not feel gimped, but as someone who plays an S/D thief main, I would feel extremely gimped. I run a mix of knight’s, zerker and p/v/hp, for a support type build. C&D is used to get me into stealth while blinding powder and shadow refuge are used to help teammates. While attacks aren’t very strong, the ability to stealth and daze makes up for it. Please don’t suggest sweeping changes because you don’t play that way our because there are other ways like the DB spam. AN keeps saying thieves thieves are masters of stealth, so why limit them to the same usability as mesmers?

According to JonathanSharp Game Designer, here…
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/news/Game-Update-Notes-December-14-2012/first#post999247

Thieves are supposed to

be very fragile if you counter their stealth with area of effects or large stacks of conditions

How do we counter their stealth with area effects or large stacks of conditions when we can’t see the thief to do so?

Svarty.8019:

How do we counter their stealth with area effects or large stacks of conditions when we can’t see the thief to do so?

Stand in your own AoE/trap and use a block or swing a melee weapon.

Agreed with maugetarr. Any x/D setups will be gimped when cloak and dagger is nerfed. Not because we’re bandwagoners, but because that’s the only reason for getting dagger offhand. Throwing dagger is worthless as a dmg output, it’s only used for crippling.
Also, using my utilities for stealthing myself is selfish when playing in group. My utilities are used for saving allies from being finished or saving them from npcs.

Maugetarr.6823:

Please don’t suggest sweeping changes because you don’t play that way our because there are other ways like the DB spam.

I did not suggest any changes at all.
I have learned not to suggest anything in the thief subforum, someone will always hate you for it.

Gwalchgwn.1659:

Any x/D setups will be gimped when cloak and dagger is nerfed. Not because we’re bandwagoners, but because that’s the only reason for getting dagger offhand.

Im not saying you are. If you use dagger just for CnD thats good for you, if you would quit the class if it was nerfed you never enjoyed thief but just one single skill.

I don’t know you though, so ask yourself if you could still enjoy your class after a nerf.

Maugetarr.6823:

Svarty.8019:

How do we counter their stealth with area effects or large stacks of conditions when we can’t see the thief to do so?

Stand in your own AoE/trap and use a block or swing a melee weapon.

Also, don’t use your condition removals too early, a small stack of bleeding isn’t worth a CD so save it for then they get out of hand. Try to manage your energy so you’re able to evade their Sneak Attack/Death Blossom in a way that they’re wasting their attack.
Battles against condition builds are attrition battles. They’re all about managing your sustainability.

Rengaru.4730:

Maugetarr.6823:

Please don’t suggest sweeping changes because you don’t play that way our because there are other ways like the DB spam.

I did not suggest any changes at all.
I have learned not to suggest anything in the thief subforum, someone will always hate you for it.

Gwalchgwn.1659:

Any x/D setups will be gimped when cloak and dagger is nerfed. Not because we’re bandwagoners, but because that’s the only reason for getting dagger offhand.

Im not saying you are. If you use dagger just for CnD thats good for you, if you would quit the class if it was nerfed you never enjoyed thief but just one single skill.

I don’t know you though, so ask yourself if you could still enjoy your class after a nerf.

Here’s the thing about CnD. It’s how Sword/Dagger and Pistol/Dagger operate because both builds rely on frequent access to their stealth skills. If stealth was nerfed in any way that gives them less access to stealth the builds would lose effectiveness in proportion to how much stealth is nerfed because they both utilize their stealth skills to deal passable damage.
So if you make those set unusable that only leaves S/P (still feeling the effects of its nerf) D/P (just because BS does that much damage), and both D/D specs just because neither really needs a lot of stealth.

Dual.8953:

they both utilize their stealth skills to deal passable damage.

Sorry thats not entirely true.

Thief Sword autoattack is one of the strongest in the game and the stealth skill deals less damage than any skill in the chain (don’t trust the tooltip, try it for yourself).

But pistol by itself is not exactly the best weapon, thats right.

Dual.8953:

So if you make those set unusable that only leaves S/P (still feeling the effects of its nerf) D/P (just because BS does that much damage), and both D/D specs just because neither really needs a lot of stealth.

Again, I did not suggest anything, neither a nerf or a buff, I play a thief myself since launch and I know what weapons thief can use and how.

(Also, of course the standard D/D Mug-CnD-Backstab needs stealth a lot)

Rengaru.4730:

I’ve been playing on my thief since launch. I never enjoyed dagger off-hand and played sword/pistol most of the time using only Shadow Refuge or Blinding Powder for stealth.

So far I don’t feel gimped when playing my thief.

Leave this thread. NOW! pls. You sir are not a thief you are number monger. Yes that`s right. See big number in rapid succession and you`re like “wow i`m so pro”. Get stranded alone in a sPVP and every and i repeat EVERY other class will stomp you.

Thieves have crappy mobility despite the popular belief (e.g. i pop shadow refuge sometimes the stealth fields takes time to render and i get almost exclusively a knock back from any class who has it, and i get dragged out of field – because they know). Thieves have crappy hp. Thieves have crappy damage and rely on the heavy use of stealth to maximize even that laughable 4-5k tops in a game where (almost?) every class has an invulnerable to damage skill and a heal skill that gives that amount of hp back.

I started a regular rotation on an engineer in an sPVP match: mug, CnD, BS, couple of auto attack chains – his response – invulnerability, started pooping mines and from there it`s a blur from the volley of attacks and effects. Albeit i`m probably not the best thief around but to utterly be humiliated by a guy who keeps “w” and leisurely presses 3 keys to get full hp and burn 15k hp in 5 secs is not balanced, is not fine and is certainly not op. Managed to down a mesmer once despite idk 4-5 dazes and a metric tone of clones? Then i get hit by his clones that don`t disappear on downed and the same clones finished me off and he rallied. Yet people get upset that i spam 2 when i don`t have anything else worth using, i don`t even get to dent them this way.

I honestly will give this game a couple more days and then i will probably quit. It`s not even about the impending stealth nerf that you people are pushing. Don`t have the time to level another class and quite frankly i won`t give Arena net and this kitteny community the satisfaction. Go ahead mesmers, guardian`s and w/e else play, here`s a thief free GW2. Go ahead, Arena net continue your policy of grooming the power houses. Just remember i bought the game too and i deserve some escape from day to day frustrations and worries, don`t i? And i leave you with this gem that was just begging to be upped brought to you by a mesmer:

Don’t be ridiculous. I simply want stealth to be what it is suppose to be from a design perspective, nothing ells. I use to play a Thief myself, but it has lost all my interests because stealth is just too much of an advantage. It makes me feel too powerful, and I like to be challenge when I play a game.

A simply way to balance stealth is to remove it completely from weapon (Cloak and Dagger) and healing (Hide in Shadows) skills.

Kasama.8941:

(snip)
…..
A simply way to balance stealth is to remove it completely from weapon (Cloak and Dagger) and healing (Hide in Shadows) skills. Thereby only making stealth a utility and elite based skill effect. This would mean the Thief would actually have to think about when to use stealth, and when to save it.
…..
(/snip)

This is what I was talking about when I was talking about sweeping changes to the thief. AN has already shown that offhand dagger is for utility rather than damage though a few nerfs to damage. Removing the major utility from half of our offhand weapon sets would be a sweeping change.

Rengaru.4730:

Dual.8953:

they both utilize their stealth skills to deal passable damage.

Sorry thats not entirely true.

Thief Sword autoattack is one of the strongest in the game and the stealth skill deals less damage than any skill in the chain (don’t trust the tooltip, try it for yourself).

But pistol by itself is not exactly the best weapon, thats right.

Dual.8953:

So if you make those set unusable that only leaves S/P (still feeling the effects of its nerf) D/P (just because BS does that much damage), and both D/D specs just because neither really needs a lot of stealth.

Again, I did not suggest anything, neither a nerf or a buff, I play a thief myself since launch and I know what weapons thief can use and how.

(Also, of course the standard D/D Mug-CnD-Backstab needs stealth a lot)

Nah. D/D BS is all about the scoring the big hit. For that they only need to stealth once.
As for S/D, the usual combat style is scoring free hits off the tactical strike’s daze. It trades the weapon skill blinds and dazes of S/P for stealth making S/D much more in tune with the Shadow Arts trait-line then S/P, more tilted to defense then offense.

My point of view:

Culling is the only problem.

I am a condition thief, and I hope not a completely hopeless one. I played crit build some time ago. This build relies heavily on the Cloak and Dagger + Backstab. I could bring people down in two seconds. Slowly I realized, that there is simply no fun and no skill in such a playstyle, that’s why I respecced to condition bleed build. And I think I realized many things.

Right now, every class can be downed in a few seconds. I know thieves, that are able to down me in sPvP in under three seconds (and remember I am running high HP condition build). It does not matter if it is a thief with lots of stealth and backstab or a warrior spinning around. What’s more, dodging backsab is not very difficult. Even these Steal → Stealth → Backstab → death “combos” can be fully avoided. Therefore, there is no problem with stealth while the Thief is running a crit build. I’ve played it and I know very well that these builds can be countered quite easily by a good player (good is an important word here).

Right now, I am running a condition build. Condition build in essence means that you have to get conditions and survive long enough in order conditions to do their job. It is much more difficult in terms of motion, motion prediction and overall requirements for versatility. I am not running a buidl that would enable any kind of “permanent” stealth chains. However, I rely on stealth a lot even though I usually don’t deal much damage out of it. Thiefs can be downed in a matter of seconds when facing a player with approximately the same level of equipment. Tell me, what are we supposed to do except stealth? We can dodge – that’s right, we have to dodge in fact, but so can and should other classes. What can we do then when in 1vs1 combat? Nothing really comes to my mind. Every single class in this game has a specific ability that makes it special. Stealth can be quite easily countered. While battling another thief, I find myself running around, thinking about his next move. You have to predict what will the thief do, and if you don’t, you’ll die. Thief is a difficult class to play, and if you don’t think I am right, you have always been playing it wrong. In my opinion thief which delas 20k instantly isn’t really a thief (and can and should be killed instantly with his 14k HP).

tl;dr: Thief and his stealth are perfectly counterable. Stealth is not bugged (except for culling), it’s just the fact that player somehow deny to learn how to counter it properly.

Dual.8953:

Nah. D/D BS is all about the scoring the big hit. For that they only need to stealth once.

For which they need CnD.
Im sorry if I misunderstood you, but your point came across as “if they remove CnD only these builds (one of them Mug-CnD-BS) remain”.

Dual.8953:

As for S/D, the usual combat style is scoring free hits off the tactical strike’s daze. It trades the weapon skill blinds and dazes of S/P for stealth making S/D much more in tune with the Shadow Arts trait-line then S/P, more tilted to defense then offense.

Again sorry if I misunderstood you, but you said CnD is needed for damage on sword-main which is not true.
Personaly I prefer Black Powder Mine to CnD, it’s a pretty strong defensive skill if you can pick the location of the fight (PvE/sPvP on a capture node).

Stardrift.7360:

Leave this thread. NOW! pls. You sir are not a thief you are number monger. Yes that`s right. See big number in rapid succession and you`re like “wow i`m so pro”. Get stranded alone in a sPVP and every and i repeat EVERY other class will stomp you.

An obvious troll, but that’s my cue.
Thanks again for reminding me why posting anything in the thief forum is a bad idea. I will leave this thread to “them pRo theifZ” (no offense to anyone).

I am seriously hoping that Anet returns to the GW1 feature of skills working differently in PvP/WvW and PvE.

As is, The PvP’ers are complaining about the Thief tearing them apart, and now the Thief is almost the weakest PvE profession. The Venom skills and Signets are almost our only underwater skills, and the PvP’ers got them nerfed so bad that they’re useless in PvE, and probably in PvP too.

And yet, the Guardian, who can already take out champion mobs solo in PvE, keeps getting stronger thanks to the PvP’ers.

This weekend, I took my Guardian, Ranger, a Thief, and my Mesmer through the same zone, which had a particularly difficult skill challenge. The Guardian, solo, did it in 15 seconds, or less. The Ranger, with it’s pet, and a Norn Wurm, took around 25 seconds. The Thief, with a seed pod, binding roots, and the Thief’s guild, took a little over a minute to complete it. The Mesmer, with a golem, and 5 clone skills took almost 5 minutes.

Balancing the game is important, but balancing it only for PvP/WvW, when those are what, a dozen or so zones, but not for PvE which has almost 3 dozen zones (dozens more if dungeons are included,) is a bit odd.

I guess it was a good thing that Anet released GW2 “when it was ready.” ROTFLMAO!!!

Jan Roman.1270:

tl;dr: Thief and his stealth are perfectly counterable. Stealth is not bugged (except for culling), it’s just the fact that player somehow deny to learn how to counter it properly.

Wow you… you are out of your mind, so much of this is you trying to oversimplify combat so you can trivialize counters to thieves abilities. In the real World vs World (see what I did thar) it almost never ever works like this. Let me give some examples:

What’s more, dodging backsab is not very difficult. Even these Steal -> Stealth -> Backstab -> death “combos” can be fully avoided. Therefore, there is no problem with stealth while the Thief is running a crit build. I’ve played it and I know very well that these builds can be countered quite easily by a good player (good is an important word here).

Except for those rare occasions when you don’t have full endurance or you’re attention is elsewhere or when you don’t have emergency skills off cooldown or you’re not attacking or rezzing someone else or basically playing the game at all. Then yea that combo can be countered so as long as you stand in one spot, on your tip toes and don’t move and are always ready for thieves then this is super easy to counter, but in reality this whole combo if far too easy to execute, far too powerful, and the risk vs reward factor is far too high.

What can we do then when in 1vs1 combat?

Uh maybe you can use your massive burst to take players down, your superior mobility to run circles around others, your many forms of stealth to control the flow of combat to what you desire ect ect

Stealth can be quite easily countered. While battling another thief, I find myself running around, thinking about his next move. You have to predict what will the thief do, and if you don’t, you’ll die.

So as long as we’re all clairvoyant and can see in our crystal balls where an invisible opponent ran off to we can counter them? Yea, that’s sounds super simple.

Tell me, what are we supposed to do except stealth? We can dodge – that’s right, we have to dodge in fact, but so can and should other classes.

You’re really going to complain that thieves don’t have any tools except stealth at their disposal, really? You have the highest mobility in the game, the most emergency buttons, one of (if not the only) class skills without a hard counter and one of the best resource systems of any class. You should really play another class where you don’t have a get out of free card and don’t just get to start and stop combat if you get in trouble.

So yea, thieves do need some MAJOR tuning in WvW, specifically to address the fact that they like every other class should have to face the consequences of their actions and don’t get to be the only class privy to a “start/stop” button in combat.

Atticus.7194:

Jan Roman.1270:

tl;dr: Thief and his stealth are perfectly counterable. Stealth is not bugged (except for culling), it’s just the fact that player somehow deny to learn how to counter it properly.

Wow you… you are out of your mind, so much of this is you trying to oversimplify combat so you can trivialize counters to thieves abilities. In the real World vs World (see what I did thar) it almost never ever works like this. Let me give some examples:

What’s more, dodging backsab is not very difficult. Even these Steal -> Stealth -> Backstab -> death “combos” can be fully avoided. Therefore, there is no problem with stealth while the Thief is running a crit build. I’ve played it and I know very well that these builds can be countered quite easily by a good player (good is an important word here).

Except for those rare occasions when you don’t have full endurance or you’re attention is elsewhere or when you don’t have emergency skills off cooldown or you’re not attacking or rezzing someone else or basically playing the game at all. Then yea that combo can be countered so as long as you stand in one spot, on your tip toes and don’t move and are always ready for thieves then this is super easy to counter, but in reality this whole combo if far too easy to execute, far too powerful, and the risk vs reward factor is far too high.

What can we do then when in 1vs1 combat?

Uh maybe you can use your massive burst to take players down, your superior mobility to run circles around others, your many forms of stealth to control the flow of combat to what you desire ect ect

Stealth can be quite easily countered. While battling another thief, I find myself running around, thinking about his next move. You have to predict what will the thief do, and if you don’t, you’ll die.

So as long as we’re all clairvoyant and can see in our crystal balls where an invisible opponent ran off to we can counter them? Yea, that’s sounds super simple.

Tell me, what are we supposed to do except stealth? We can dodge – that’s right, we have to dodge in fact, but so can and should other classes.

You’re really going to complain that thieves don’t have any tools except stealth at their disposal, really? You have the highest mobility in the game, the most emergency buttons, one of (if not the only) class skills without a hard counter and one of the best resource systems of any class. You should really play another class where you don’t have a get out of free card and don’t just get to start and stop combat if you get in trouble.

So yea, thieves do need some MAJOR tuning in WvW, specifically to address the fact that they like every other class should have to face the consequences of their actions and don’t get to be the only class privy to a “start/stop” button in combat.

Warriors have the Highest Mobility, then Elementalists as a close second.

He is right, thieves have a pattern how long they stealth/restealth, and many of them all follow the pattern, take time to learn this and thieves are easier, this is why as a thief I have no trouble killing other thieves.

Thieves are quite balanced in WvWvW due to the strengths they have and don’t have, they don’t have the aoe capabilities and survivability and sustained damage other classes have, due to have little to no access to boons, and they do not help there team-mates unless they plan on being useless or gimping themselves.

Thieves actually need more access to boons such as swiftness and fury and a slight nerf to burst, but a big increase to sustained damage.

Thieves need a lot more survivability in SPVP and PVE.

Thieves also have little to no access to crowd control, we have very few abilitys that can knock people down or away.

Thief is also a very narcissistic class, as I mention before, we are “not” team players, which sucks, because this is a very team oriented game.

Doman.3042:

Let me start by mentioning that I love a lot of the game’s design already, and that I really admire how well you’ve pulled off one of your design goals so far: diversity and customization. I’ve been experimenting with builds and I love that I can at least try to go in as many directions as I can. I love that I’m not as pigeonholed as I’ve been in other games – personally, I like stealthy characters but hate burst playstyles, so the skirmishing and zone control that a survivable condition damage thief with Pistol/Dagger and Caltrops has just – really hits this crunchy, satisfying accord with me. In PvP, there’s room for a lot of counterplay from the opponent when I go that spec, and that feels exactly right for making sure that both people have fun in the fight. (On that note, I also love that stealth doesn’t last long and is best used for a quick reposition – you have to use it intelligently and actively instead of always skulking through the battlefield unseen. It makes a traditionally passive mechanic into an active one, which is really admirable of the guy that made that design decision!)

I think that from an objective game design standpoint, specs like the Basilisk Venom-Cloak and Dagger-Mug-Backstab combo don’t give the opponent enough time to react to allow for counterplay. With the condition damage bunker build, the game is more about strategy – are you smart enough to dismantle my build and figure out a weakness in my pattern? With the backstab combo, the game is more about execution (and this burden of execution is really on the thief’s opponent to dodge than the thief themself to attack) – can you react fast enough to stunbreak and move out of the way of the giant wrecking ball of damage?

[This link is a great read] for what I’m talking about. Right now, the design of PvP feels inconsistent – do you want to value strategy or execution more? I can’t really tell. There are elements of both, but they don’t really mix – when the rewards for an imbalance of execution are high enough, there’s simply that much of an execution barrier to new players – “you must be able to fend off a six-pool/pull off one-frame Sakura timings/stunbreak out of Basilisk Venom.”

I’m not saying one is strictly better than the other all the time, but a question to ask yourselves when you go into your next design meeting is “Which style does Guild Wars 2 better lend itself to? What’s better for all players involved, and not just one side of the fence?” Personally, my vote’s for a strategy-heavy game. (I mean, there has to be SOME level of execution barrier, otherwise you get complaints about Heartseeker spam, but then there’s going too far in the execution-fetishism end.)

Thanks for your time, and double-thanks for asking us for feedback! Especially during the Thanksgiving holidays, I’m sorta surprised you guys are in at this time of the year. Have a good weekend, y’all.

I really like the thoughts that this user is putting forward. For me sPvP is just as much the “mind-game” as it is the actual fighting. Like a game of chess. There has to be room for counter-playing each other – and what determines the outcome is the execution of your combos/utilities and outsmarting the enemy. The most satisfying 1vs1’s (and team-battles) are always the ones where even if you lose, you had a good time – because you know you opponent won fairly and that you put up a good fight.

That being said – I don’t think that damage nerfs per se will be the solution to burst-builds like Haste + PW or HS spamming. Someone earlier mentioned something else that might be a better and more satisfying solution, following the line of thought of execution and the mind-game. The solution was simply that you had to build up to the big finish. Or in other words: You had to deserve the burst damage.

The concrete example given was stacks of bleeding causing more damage – that of course would spell a big problem thieves without a bleed / condition build. Another solution could be something along the lines of the already implemented “Adrenaline” system that warriors enjoy or change the abilities themselves.

An example of that could be (and don’t kill me this is just an idea) to change Pistol Whip to consume all -remaining- initiative and do more damage for each point of initiative that it consumes. This requires you to either save initiative during the battle for your execution – or getting a strong start of the battle- but having to last the rest with diminished initiative. – This also means that Pistol Whip will not be viable with Haste and can’t work as a burt.

That’s all I can think of right now…

P.S. please fix stealth so that pets don’t follow you after you pop it! It’s one of our only ways of escape!

Kasama.8941:

This is what was said about stealth for the Thief, when it was first revealed:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWm8dTrEyWM

(watch from 2:50 to 3:21)

Interview (http://kotaku.com/5780900/the-guild-wars-2-thief-is-a-rogue-like-none-other):
“Stealth in Guild Wars 2 runs on a timer, which would allow you a few precious seconds of Initiative recharge before the enemy uncovers you again.

The wise Thief player will know when to retreat and recharge."

“Players are used to going toe-to-toe with monsters, and the Thief is built around hopping in-and-out of combat. If you don’t know when to back off, you’re going to die.”

Here’s the description of stealth from wiki:
“Stealth — Thieves have access to multiple skills which, for a short duration, make them invisible to enemy players and avoid aggro of hostile NPCs. While stealthed the thief is not targettable, but can still be damaged by attacks which hit them, and attacking from stealth will break the deception.”

And from the 14th december update notes:
“Thieves are the masters of mobility, stealth and high single target damage. They can be very fragile if you counter their stealth with area of effects or large stacks of conditions, but they trade this fragility in order to have some of the highest burst damage in the game. They are able to help allies through traps, venoms and the mobility to flank most encounters.”

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Now look at these resent videos I picked randomly from YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9grDRzNT_wg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4m2mGDUL38
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7OYniHrGqE

The thing to notice about these videos isn’t only that the Thief is able to have stealth up for what seems to be next to permanently, but also how easily the Thief is able to escape once low on health. That shadow stepping makes the Thief able to easily escape AoE attacks and snares. That with Cloak and Dagger the Thief can keep stealth up without any lose to playstyle, thanks to the fast recharge of initiative. That “Revealed” is not a hinderance for the Thief at all, because the three seconds that the Thief can’t stealth, is the time that’s spend on attacking anyway. That the Thief don’t have to use their utilities for anything, other then gaining more stealth. And that on top of all of this, the Thief can also use skills like Dagger Storm to avoid damage, or Thieves Guild as pseudo clones for distraction.

This is how the majority of Thieves play: Stealth to get the upper hand and maximum damage on first attack, attack for three seconds until Revealed has passed, gain stealth again to regain positioning on your foe, attacking him again when he’s got his back turned, keep attacking him as he tries to run away with 20% health left, alternatively use shadow stepping or cripple to stop him from escaping, stealth again when he’s downed so he or an ally can’t stop you from stomping him, and then stealth/shadow step away, or start attacking the ally who was trying to help the foe you just stomped. If three or more players finally do manage to get you down to low health; use shadow stepping/Dagger Storm/Thieves Guild to get away, go back into stealth to make your foes lose track of you, hide until your health is restored, proceed to attacking again.

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Am I the only one who can see the contradictory between how ArenaNet wants the Thief to play, and how it is actually played? I’m not sure how anyone (other then a Thief maybe) can justify stealth, for the Thief, as being balanced. I mean, how are you suppose to fight a profession that you can’t see for 80% of a fight, and who can easily escape you during the 20% window where you actually do see him? How is this fun to play against?

The thief counters don’t work.

AoE and large stacks of conditions can only be used when you know the thief is there (and conditions have to be used while it is visible!) and by then you are dead.

So this is where all the Thief topics go to die. I guess that’s a way to fix the problems..

Ehm, I don’t know who wrote this but I quote:

“The thief don’t have to use their utilities for anything, other then gaining more stealth”

This is just silly. First of all – you have to be playing a D/D for stealth-builds to be useful in the long run. Secondly – only a noob thief would only have stealth utilities in his belt – or atleast only a thief that is trolling around random servers in sPvP enjoying the whinning of the players he nuked.

In tPvP or if you’re just a good teamplayer in general – you’d select a much more varied set of utilities, not to mention that you also atleast need a stunbreaker to not get nuked yourself.

Genome.6073:

Ehm, I don’t know who wrote this but I quote:

“The thief don’t have to use their utilities for anything, other then gaining more stealth”

This is just silly. First of all – you have to be playing a D/D for stealth-builds to be useful in the long run. Secondly – only a noob thief would only have stealth utilities in his belt – or atleast only a thief that is trolling around random servers in sPvP enjoying the whinning of the players he nuked.

In tPvP or if you’re just a good teamplayer in general – you’d select a much more varied set of utilities, not to mention that you also atleast need a stunbreaker to not get nuked yourself.

Sadly variations in utility skills means you are just opting to be a support jack of all trades instead a damage dealer which is silly for a glass cannon. If u don`t mind being a ress/stomper/cap bot then by all means the more varied the better. That ensures survivability and mobility on the expense of damage. If however you want to win a 1 v 1 (i sound like a broken record) from time to time then you get something (venoms – or at least some of them + burst, stealth + burst, bleed + stealth/heal or traps + ranged and idk w/e else) that works for you and stick to it. Unless you are very good, have everything mapped and you are totally aware of the environment – in that case kudos it`s time you moved on to another game.