I think I might have an idea why the devs avoid posting on this sub forum. However, the problem goes deeper than “they’ll get demolished when they step into the forums”. Its more like a complex mechanism of annihilation.
We know they lack some needed experience beyond testing. They know we know. Exactly why this is so is up for speculation, but regardless of the reason it is hard to discuss something you do not know alot about with people who know everything about it. It is awkward and almost embarrassing considering it’s their game.
They also know that a majority of the thief cry posts usually gets bombarded by thieves in the harshest manner possible. This, at its core, is due to ignorance. The thing is that all of the toxicity thrown our way has made us toxic aswell. More often than not, we explain maybe once and then go directly to the harsh comments. This needs to change.
Thief is not a casual profession. There is no mindless rotation into infinity. It forces the player to be much more reactive due to their skill design. The initiative system indirectly restricts the defensive and offensive capabilities of the thief, meaning that there must be constant management of initiative instead of the more mindless “wait until skill is off CD” design. As such, the thief has the highest skill ceiling of any profession in the game. It can be a turnoff or a detriment to people who do not have the mental agility to effectively play one. That doesn’t mean that an agile mind cannot be made.
Because the thief is designed differently from other professions, balancing is a whole different beast. Number tweaks become multiplicative instead of a sum. Sometimes it is so bad that a mechanics change seems easier to do. As you can see from [Teef]’s first SoT most of the suggestions were small but alot of them were designed to be put on par with other traits of their tier. Some required small number changes, other were changed completely. This is probably what anet puts up with daily with this profession. This is probably one of the bigger reasons why they only read this section: balancing thief is hell and we, as a profession community will most likely not help them in any way.
So how will we get developers to dip their feet into the murky waters of this profession knowing that these few issues make doing so not a very good idea to do? A few things could happen:
Anet bites the bullet and metaphorically starts sacrificing their devs to the thief community. They get in here, make a few posts and comments, get chewed up for w/e reason and learn from it so that the next time they post they won’t get chewed up as much. We, the thief community, could moderate our own by keeping toxicity to a minimum in order to ease the devs into this sacrificial cesspool. Meanwhile we condition ourselves to bite the bullet on anet decisions aswell whenever we talk with these devs. Conditioning and compromise would be required by both sides. Its is doable but painful.
An anet developer could join [Teef]. Events could be set up to talk or teach the developer about the profession through instruction and training. We most likely have a great majority of the most dedicated and knowledgeable thieves in the game and there would be no doubt the anet dev would get fully immersed in the profession in under 3 weeks.
The entire thief community changes their attitude from a defeatist, self-victimizing one to a “Can do!” constructive attitude. Yes, I said it. You guys really do mope about all the nerfs even when there are some things to be positive about. Actually there are ALOT of things to be positive about. Hard to Catch? Last Refuge? That is diamond-grade proof anet listens! Change that crap, be more inviting and anet will start commenting.
Finally….
Maybe a dev can come in here and explain exactly what the thief community could do to get some more developer action. Only they would know what it would truly take.
What do you guys think?
Liaison for [Teef]
“Please stop complaining about stuff you don’t even know about.” ~Nocta
Anet is like a hardcore feminist…They accept the P/P, but will do anything in their power to make it less powerful.
Some of us have a few reasons to mope and it’s not because we don’t have a “Can do!” attitude. It’s because they completely butcher “play the way you want” mentality. It’s fine to have little nerfs here and there, but when you step in and render a full weapon set completely obsolete, people tend to get a little outraged. I say we will have a “Can do!” attitude when they give us reasons for such harsh changes.
My name is Girbilcannon and I represent P/P thieves around the globe. Vote for me!
I think they are waiting for the release of the Elite before they address anything else. Plus once, (if ever) we get to play this “Elite” in a beta weekend they require our feedback and are active on the forums with each profession that’s up to be tested.
Our time to shine will come soon, to address current and future issues with the Thief. I feel for you trust me I want a response from them too, but trying to draw them out of hiding on this thread will accomplish little to nothing.
They can’t fix anything without trying to step into our shadows. I think they are just worried of getting flamed but there are a number of well behaved thieves who would gladly give feedback on the matter and contribute to a meaningful discussion.
This can’t happen though without some dev getting out of that comfort bubble and more importantly, they have to want thief to succeed. If they just send any dev and they happen to give a kitten about thief our responses will get nowhere.
“I’m waiting for the staff to get off their lunch
break. I feel like they should be back by now..”
Right now, the cries for civility—made in hopes they’ll get thief the attention from developers that it hasn’t gotten in years—are sounding awfully familiar from my WoW rogue days…
I hate to say it, but if there ever was a time for civility, it’s over. As someone who has played a rogue in just about every MMO where it’s possible to do so, I have watched this cycle play out time and time again over the years, both with rogues and other classes.
What made the difference between classes that got the attention they needed and those that did not? Volume. In every single case where I’ve seen a class successfully petition for sorely needed attention, it was only volume and persistence that made it happen. Players have to make it a problem the developers simply can’t afford to ignore, or they will continue to do so in favor of any other number of issues. That’s just the reality of online game development, unfortunately.
The elite specialization reveal is not far on the horizon. Be ready with both your most critical and your LOUDEST feedback, because we’re gonna need it.
I’m perfectly willing to participate in a civil discussion, as I’m sure much of the thief community is. however, a discussion requires that both sides are talking – we’re doing our part, civilised or otherwise.
and civility is based on respect – a street which goes both ways. if the devs won’t sit down and have a reasonable discussion, then it’s because they either don’t think we deserve it, or they don’t care. either way, they’re earning no respect from me on that front.
so, yes, I’d like a discussion about thief. but I don’t think it’s the players who are stopping this from happening.
Pretty sure they won’t ever buff thief as hard as they buffed condi Mesmer… So I really don’t care anymore about this class. Just going to play condi Mesmer and 1v3 people in spvp.
They probably don’t. Just silently watching the forum is the best way to gauge how we feel, because as soon as they post people are going to exaggerate all the problems we have and we’ll end up getting overbuffed. Then the mesmers will complain again.
Resident Disgruntled, Coffee-drinking Charr.
Zarin Mistcloak(THF) Valkyrie Mistblade(WAR) Kossori Mistwalker(REV) Durendal Mistward(GRD)
I used to think (build op, pls nerf) like you, but then I took a nerf to the knee.
“Mos Eisley Spaceport The thief forum. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious.”
-devs
Joking aside, this place can be pretty hostile towards devs. I can understand why they wouldn’t want to spend their spare time here. No one wants to work hard at something just to be yelled at.
“Mos Eisley Spaceport The thief forum. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious.”
-devs
Joking aside, this place can be pretty hostile towards devs. I can understand why they wouldn’t want to spend their spare time here. No one wants to work hard at something just to be yelled at.
Have you been to necro forums?!! They did and guess what? We stopped bringing doom and they bring satisfying results, there is no excuse to not talk to your community no matter how hostile it can get because you both want the same results unless of course the dev is doing it to not get fired and no one else wants to do it.
“Revenant is actual proof that devs read the necromancer forum” – Pelopidas.2140 The Dhuumfire thread
“Mos Eisley Spaceport The thief forum. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious.”
-devs
Joking aside, this place can be pretty hostile towards devs. I can understand why they wouldn’t want to spend their spare time here. No one wants to work hard at something just to be yelled at.
I’ve not been around for ages, but for my part, all and any resentment towards the devs is pretty much entirely based around their lack of interaction. the less they talk, the worse it’ll get.
1. They don’t want to read walls of text for sure.
2. I am also sure most thieves would leave feedback in civilized manner as well as hold discussion with devs w/o spitting toxicity if there was a dev that actually was interested in putting effort to learn this profession and improve it instead of seeing thief balancing as unpleasant chore instead of fun challenge…. We are not monsters after all and we are all interested in the healthy class. It is all up to devs.
3. Reading Anet ex-workers feedback about company i highly doubt any of them have time for us (nor would get paid for it).
As a P/P Thief, a Gunslinging-noStealth-motherkitten … what do I want?
I would like my Acrobatics trait tree -as a whole!- to keep proper pace with & be an equivalent form of defense to Shadow Arts
I would like some attention paid to the fact that our -oh so fun!- Dual Pistols have been crapped on, in an effort to rein in D/P and P/D.
I want Venoms reworked into something Thieves can love and take pride in.
I want the exact same for Traps, and Thief skill use underwater. Let’s be honest here, at some point, ANet’s going to make us fight Bubbles … and Thieves are underequipped for that battle.
I absolutely want Thieves to have a Dev like Robert Gee, who not only has interesting ideas for improving the class, but can actually coordinate with, and -when it’s actually a good idea- can honestly listen to the folks who love the Profession, and simply want to see it perform at its best.
Now, can Thieves acquire some of these (reasonable) gains?
Malegryne (Sylvari Mesmer), Lannka (Asura Thief) – Ferguson’s Crossing: [PRD/BRB/OMFG]
Other 80s: Any but Warrior
As a P/P Thief, a Gunslinging-noStealth-motherkitten … what do I want?
I would like my Acrobatics trait tree -as a whole!- to keep proper pace with & be an equivalent form of defense to Shadow Arts
I would like some attention paid to the fact that our -oh so fun!- Dual Pistols have been crapped on, in an effort to rein in D/P and P/D.
I want Venoms reworked into something Thieves can love and take pride in.
I want the exact same for Traps, and Thief skill use underwater. Let’s be honest here, at some point, ANet’s going to make us fight Bubbles … and Thieves are underequipped for that battle.
I absolutely want Thieves to have a Dev like Robert Gee, who not only has interesting ideas for improving the class, but can actually coordinate with, and -when it’s actually a good idea- can honestly listen to the folks who love the Profession, and simply want to see it perform at its best.
Now, can Thieves acquire some of these (reasonable) gains?
we must gather the dragon balls, throw all our precursors into the mystic forge, pray to the 5 true gods (Kormir’s a false positive) and sacrifice an elder dragon.
As a P/P Thief, a Gunslinging-noStealth-motherkitten … what do I want?
I would like my Acrobatics trait tree -as a whole!- to keep proper pace with & be an equivalent form of defense to Shadow Arts
I would like some attention paid to the fact that our -oh so fun!- Dual Pistols have been crapped on, in an effort to rein in D/P and P/D.
I want Venoms reworked into something Thieves can love and take pride in.
I want the exact same for Traps, and Thief skill use underwater. Let’s be honest here, at some point, ANet’s going to make us fight Bubbles … and Thieves are underequipped for that battle.
I absolutely want Thieves to have a Dev like Robert Gee, who not only has interesting ideas for improving the class, but can actually coordinate with, and -when it’s actually a good idea- can honestly listen to the folks who love the Profession, and simply want to see it perform at its best.
Now, can Thieves acquire some of these (reasonable) gains?
I like the sound of it. My fear is that they nerfed acrobatics so they could give us acrobatics 2.0 in our elite spec and we’d be happy to just get it back. Also, don’t forget about Roy and his swift remedy of Sword 3 for Revenant. I wouldn’t mind seeing him address Deathblossom.
What I want to know is why Warriors has better dual-wielding skills than Thieves, which a profession with Dual-wield ability?
Thieves should have 5 skills dual-wield regardless of weapon choice. Instead of main-main-dw-off-off, it should be dw-dw-dw-dw-dw — 5 skills in our weapon bar all dual-wield. Each skills uses both weapons 24/7.
http://sirvincentiii.com ~ In the beginning…there was Tarnished Coast…
Full set of 5 unique skills for both dual-wield weapon sets: P/P and D/D – Make it happen
PvE – DD/CS/AC – If that didn’t work, roll a Reaper or Revenant.
What I want to know is why Warriors has better dual-wielding skills than Thieves, which a profession with Dual-wield ability?
Thieves should have 5 skills dual-wield regardless of weapon choice. Instead of main-main-dw-off-off, it should be dw-dw-dw-dw-dw — 5 skills in our weapon bar all dual-wield. Each skills uses both weapons 24/7.
Not sure it’s better Vincent, and to be honest. They are warrior, they are supposed to master any weapons. I think it’s only natural that they master weapons better than us Thieves.
“Mos Eisley Spaceport The thief forum. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious.”
-devs
Joking aside, this place can be pretty hostile towards devs. I can understand why they wouldn’t want to spend their spare time here. No one wants to work hard at something just to be yelled at.
Work hard? In what moment has there been any evidence of a dev working kitten thief? The released some short videos explaining thief in fractals (only to die repeatedly) and show us how various skills proc signet of malice healing and small features of thief. There is no passion for thief from anet, and its grown more and more apparent with these balance updates. They really should show the community some effort and I’d be willing to bet any rude or uncalled for comments will be quickly shut out by the numerous thief fanatics who want a meaningful discussion with the developers.
I sincerely doubt the respectful thief players would rage at anet if they opened such a thread, even if it feels justified. We just want progress.
“I’m waiting for the staff to get off their lunch
break. I feel like they should be back by now..”
“Mos Eisley Spaceport The thief forum. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious.”
-devs
Joking aside, this place can be pretty hostile towards devs. I can understand why they wouldn’t want to spend their spare time here. No one wants to work hard at something just to be yelled at.
Work hard? In what moment has there been any evidence of a dev working kitten thief? The released some short videos explaining thief in fractals (only to die repeatedly) and show us how various skills proc signet of malice healing and small features of thief. There is no passion for thief from anet, and its grown more and more apparent with these balance updates. They really should show the community some effort and I’d be willing to bet any rude or uncalled for comments will be quickly shut out by the numerous thief fanatics who want a meaningful discussion with the developers.
I sincerely doubt the respectful thief players would rage at anet if they opened such a thread, even if it feels justified. We just want progress.
Well, trying. Effort was put in, although I agree that a lot of times it was seen by the people who play thief as more groan worthy than anything else and we mocked them for the effort.
“Mos Eisley Spaceport The thief forum. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious.”
-devs
Joking aside, this place can be pretty hostile towards devs. I can understand why they wouldn’t want to spend their spare time here. No one wants to work hard at something just to be yelled at.
Work hard? In what moment has there been any evidence of a dev working kitten thief? The released some short videos explaining thief in fractals (only to die repeatedly) and show us how various skills proc signet of malice healing and small features of thief. There is no passion for thief from anet, and its grown more and more apparent with these balance updates. They really should show the community some effort and I’d be willing to bet any rude or uncalled for comments will be quickly shut out by the numerous thief fanatics who want a meaningful discussion with the developers.
I sincerely doubt the respectful thief players would rage at anet if they opened such a thread, even if it feels justified. We just want progress.
I’ve noticed a real lack of developer representation for rogue archetypes in nearly every class-based MMO I’ve played, and it continues to baffle me. Why is it so hard to find a single senior developer passionate about the Thief’s unique brand of agility and dark pragmatism?
Still managed to have one of the few posts on this sub-forum that a developer responded to but I agree mainly to the point that this sub-forum can be harsh to even its own regular posters. I’ve seen countless times in which a dev has talked to the people and the people raise pitchforks in response for other media and I hope this sub-forum is smart enough to not do that
What I want to know is why Warriors has better dual-wielding skills than Thieves, which a profession with Dual-wield ability?
Thieves should have 5 skills dual-wield regardless of weapon choice. Instead of main-main-dw-off-off, it should be dw-dw-dw-dw-dw — 5 skills in our weapon bar all dual-wield. Each skills uses both weapons 24/7.
Not sure it’s better Vincent, and to be honest. They are warrior, they are supposed to master any weapons. I think it’s only natural that they master weapons better than us Thieves.
The point is, Thief have an exclusive access to dual-wield yet they fall short at dual-wielding compare to Warrior. The idea of dual-wield is so limited for Thief that it only affect the skill #3 where the Warrior can use both weapons from other skill slots. The bottom line is, while Warrior’s skill sets and mechanics are being improved…the Thief’s skills and mechanics are not. There has been no real progress for the Thief, only regress.
http://sirvincentiii.com ~ In the beginning…there was Tarnished Coast…
Full set of 5 unique skills for both dual-wield weapon sets: P/P and D/D – Make it happen
PvE – DD/CS/AC – If that didn’t work, roll a Reaper or Revenant.
There has been no real progress for the Thief, only regress.
Yes, and maybe that’s the problem, maybe that is why no one is talking to us.
I think although we are a bunch of weirdos we kind of grew together and managed to produce something constructive over the past few weeks.
But: Thief is at a breaking point, the class has been ignored for too long. Anet better comes up with something good and maybe they know.
They have made some really bad choices when it comes to buffing other classes: Passive protection, passive heal, passive this and passive that – Since they just buffed these classes they can’t nerf them right away (although they should), so they’d now have to buff other classes likewise so we all become tiny tanks steamrolling our way through wvw and pvp and QQing each time we lose. I’m curious what will come next.
I think they are waiting for the release of the Elite before they address anything else. Plus once, (if ever) we get to play this “Elite” in a beta weekend they require our feedback and are active on the forums with each profession that’s up to be tested.
Our time to shine will come soon, to address current and future issues with the Thief. I feel for you trust me I want a response from them too, but trying to draw them out of hiding on this thread will accomplish little to nothing.
It won’t help if you only have one beta weekend to play and finalize things before launch. Where other classes will/already had opportunities to so call “Shine” and continue to voice there feedback. There is a reason why rogue classes are being dealt with last, they are the most broke and the most angered about. They will bear it for one weekend and than say “Opps, sorry out of time we have to launch things. Better luck next expansion.”
but I agree mainly to the point that this sub-forum can be harsh to even its own regular posters. I’ve seen countless times in which a dev has talked to the people and the people raise pitchforks in response for other media and I hope this sub-forum is smart enough to not do that