Guild Wars 2

So, a long time ago I tried to come up with a bunker thief build that some of you may have seen. Relying on the high toughness and decent healing power of the settler’s amulet, that build tried to be tanky through the use of Signet of Malice and caltrop/poison field ticks.

Unfortunately that build also relied heavily on stealth for condi clear and regeneration. At the end of the day it couldn’t be an actual bunker due to the fact that one cannot cap while stealthed.

With the new daredevil spec though, I think it’s possible to build a somewhat viable (yet still off-meta) bunker thief. I don’t have HoT so I can’t practice/refine this build myself. But this is what I came up with when trying to theorycraft a daredevil bunker thief:

Weapons: s/d & sb
Trinket: Settler’s ( +1200 Toughness, +900 Healing Power, +900 Condition Damage)
Runes/Sigils: Undead Runes, Leeching/Energy for both weaponsets
Traits: Acro/Trick/Dare (3/3/1, 1/2/1, 3/2/1 – respectively)
Utility Skills: Signet of Malice, Caltrops/Signet of Agility/Bandit’s Defense, Impact Strike
Build Constructor: [Link]

Thoughts:
I already was dropping poison fields often with my old bunker thief build since they can offer up to 5 ticks of SoM. So I took Lotus Training with the idea that one can whirl finish inside their own poison fields for poison bolts (Those bolts plus the daggers give extra SoM ticks aswell). Leeching/Energy Sigils and Quick pockets are meant to encourage weapon switching whenever possible since both weaponsets have decent sustain. Beyond that though this build focuses mostly on dropping caltrops on points and dodging as much as possible. SoM and poison/caltrop fields scale with the number of enemies you’re facing, so theoretically it may be possible to bunker against more than one person for a decent amount of time.

In the end though I haven’t tested this build out myself so I can’t really say how it’ll perform. If any of you folks care to try it out I’d like to know how it goes for you (I’m waiting for HoT to be cheaper or I’d test/refine it myself >_>). On the other hand though, if anyone else is testing out some bunker-ish/non-stealth thief builds that are good at holding points feel free to share/discuss them here. I’m curious if there’s a dodge-spam thief build out there that’s good at holding points.

I’m testing out the idea of a bunker thief lately too. the best I’ve come up with so far is a bruiser build utilizing Pistol Whip and high endurance regen for invulnerability up time and lots of CCs. I had pretty good success on it, but I still find it hard to sustain a 1v2 for a extended period of time.

The idea of using high toughness and healing power with leeching to maximize effective HP sounds very exciting to me. I will be playing with this build and tell you how it turns out later

Ah forgot about the long evade period on pistol whip. It could be better than s/d considering you get more evade time/initiative (~1.25 evade/5 init on s/p while s/d offers 0.5s evade/4 init).

Feel free to change the build as you see fit. Would recommend trying to keep a healthy amount of condi-clear when experimenting though. Problem with low vit & high toughness builds is that they are pretty susceptible to condi’s (The ability to fullheal and proc Pain Response multiple times helps with this though).

I played the build for a few matches while trying out different tweaks, first off, I have to say that matching SOM with lotus training is a great idea, it give you quite substantial amount of healing while you dodge, 9 × 177 max, and it’s going to heal that much very often.

This build have very respectable sustain when you can consistently hit things. The damage you deal isn’t bad either, with lots of AOE condition damage, you can choose between using choking gas for more SOM proc, or cluster bomb for more bleed damage. The damage is spread between bleed, torment and poison, couple with the constant cripple, this makes it harder for certain classes to cleanse the condition you put on.

The biggest weakness of this build is how vulnerable to CC it is, with only 11k health, being instantly downed is quite a possibility, which is why I swapped out Bandit’s Defense in favour of Shadowstep. After blocking with Bandit’s Defense as you stun break, you’re locked into a kick move, which can and will get you killed. hard to catch does give you one free chance to live though, so it isn’t too harsh.

Another weakness is condi bomb attacks, with one trick and Agility Signet plus your dodges, it takes too long to remove multiple conditions, it becomes a gamble, if RNG decide to remove 1 stack of torment instead of 5 stack of burning, it’s going to hurt a lot. Slotting shadowstep does help alleviate this issue.

I also slotted Daggerstorm for elite, the health you gain from Daggerstorm is quite substantial, while it make you immune to your biggest weakness, CC.

This build highly rely on hitting things to keep your health up, this makes kiting very strong against this build. the shortbow aoe can’t do much to people who are kiting, they only need to step out of the poison field, and not stand near you for your cluster bomb to be useless. you can’t really out damage your foe with your sword either, as it is more of a survival tool in this build. It’s not a big downside though, as you can just LOS away until the enemy stand on the point.

I did try using Dagger/Dagger instead of sword, but Death Blossom has poor range, poor aoe, and poor evade. Death Blossom so bad. I’d say use either S/D if you’d like the potential boon strip. or S/P for more CC, and a really good heal if pistol whip connects.

I put up a video with a clip that I believe showcase the strength and weakness of this build quite well.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3v2i9RDbeA

We didn’t do well on the match, but I do think this showcased the build quite well, and its potential to contest a point for a long time, even a DD ele can’t 1v2 forever, so I don’t consider eventually ding to be a failure.

Ah, the bandit’s defense/Impact Strike was a bit of wishful thinking on my part. Wasn’t sure if the kick after on bandit’s defense would be a problem. I can see shadowstep working to help as a condi clear/stunbreak though. Also actually did use Dagger Storm on the old build for a whirl finisher.

Nice vid. I do think it showcases the build’s playstyle and strengths/weaknesses very well. I think I’d do a bit more dodge spamming/offensive dodges myself but overall the playing was done correctly. Kyhlo is definitely one of the better spots for this build due to the small capture points that can easily be covered with condi fields.

In terms of survivability, I think it may be worth testing DA going 2/2/1 or 2/2/2 instead of getting Acro. Less condi clear and vigor. But mug offers a 2.5k on demand heal that can work better against burst situations (compared to the 10s & 2.4k heal over time of Pain Response). Slotting in Potent Poison with a Sigil of Venom and Sigil of bursting also makes your poison damage go from 215 per tick to 447 (for sb 4 at least). Probably would be good to drop Quick Pockets for Sleight of Hand with those changes though, for lower cd on mug among other things.

Cheaper? Every game is $60

yall forget bunkers are supposed to bring support, AOE boons, heals & condi clear. theif will still be an inferior bunker even if you can figure out a ‘tanky’ build. the support just isn’t there.

After testing yesterday I came to the conclusion thieves will not be able to adequately play the roll of a bunker or a ‘bruiser’. Without a way constantly generate boons such as regeneration or protection a single hit is enough to kitten your existence since you’re still just too dam squishy.

My theory so far, after both beta weekends is that DP is still going to be our only playable spec, either with what we have now or DD trick and Sarts, but due to all the stealth hate and reveal additions DP won’t function so… Thieves won’t be a part of the meta for the first season.