Guild Wars 2

I’ve been toying around with the idea of a viper thief for quite some time, and I’d like to get some feedback on what you guys think so far about it. It is still a work in process though

Build Link: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAoYVn8lCdmiFNBWmCkmilWCb7QFdSUaBgQ0CYeEuCfhA-TBSBQB9TPg/2fojKDomSPAcCAc2DAwMKBbo6PkCYRhVA-e

I originally took Deadly Arts for potent poison and dagger training, and played around with deadly trapper. However it just didn’t seem efficient to me. So I took Revealed Training for the +200 power..because I think I’d use a modified rotation of D/D backstab thief. And the extra power helps us out.

I went into Critical Strikes mainly to make up for a lack of ferocity and crit damage. It gives us 17% crit dmg, plus 250 ferocity with fury (which will constantly be on us), and precision to ferocity which comes on viper gear.

Lastly, I went into DD for Havoc Mastery and Lotus Training (I haven’t played around with Bounding Dodger yet).

As far as food goes, I wasn’t sure so I took Veggie Pizza and Toxic sharpening stone to help cap out poison duration to 100% with the help of malice sigil (which opens up the opportunity to explore with runes). I went with runes of the berserker because it seemed like an obvious hybrid option.

Let me know what you think please, and in terms of viability (I know thief isn’t even that high up because of it’s selfishness) but yah. Let me know what you guys think, and improvements I can make etc.

— JJohnsin [BooK]

What kind of PvE? If it’s solo map exploring, then the build is ok ish. If it’s any kind of group content (raids, fractals, dungeons, meta events), CS needs to go in favor of venomshare in SA.

I’m not actually that convinced on SA being useful, even in group content if you aren’t running multiple venoms. Really all you pick up is 20% recharge, and a little life siphon. In instanced content, going CS will be a higher DPS increase (I guess I haven’t crunched the numbers) than going venomshare. Unlike the current venomshare build, which alternates between Death Blossom and Lotus..this is an adapted build focusing on poison uptime and dagger autos for DPS.

I might be missing the importance to venomshare though, what does it bring to the table other than a minor 8 sec CD on spider venom?

Like the thing about condi thiefs in PvE is that the ramp up time for them to build up the condi stacks for the dps of the build to shine is too long for the majority of mobs you are going to fight. On average, it takes my viper build twice as long to kill a group of trash mobs compared to my zerker staff build. The same applies to soloing champions in open world.

The build really shines in high level fractals where toughness starts to be an issue or raids fights like Vale Guardian.

But this hybrid version is going equally bad at both. You don’t have the ferocity from the gear to justify going into Critical Strikes as opposed to going into Trickery for more condis, dmg percentage increase and more initiative for death blossom spam or Shadow Arts for the group utility.

Critical Strikes starts to spiral into massive damage, because if you min max a power/precision/ferocity gear setup, you can get 100% critical strike chance when fury is up with critical damage at like 250% with No Quarter. In your build, your critical damage is only 166% and your crit chance with fury is going to be 64%, meaning you can’t keep high fury uptime from No Quarter. The lack of constant critical means you will constantly drop fury and have to wait for the ICD on Unrelenting Strikes to cycle to get it again. The benefits from Critical Strikes line are not equal or flat; they are exponential to some degree since they work off synergy between power precision and ferocity. The weaker your overall stats in all three, the less value it gives your dps.

Also, this build works by spamming Death Blossom and dodge with Lotus Training, both of which have a fraction of the base damage of skills and dodges in a staff build with Bound, so you aren’t getting a ton of value from your crits. For comparison, here is the build I have been running the last few days.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAW6an8lCVmiFmCOOBkmildCbeB+Argd7gZwPYLAUbaTA-TBSBABLqEELlGiq+DAPpAyUid1+jygC198wFVgMA6LA-e

Looking at our dodges, you are dodging for 121 base damage with a 66% crit chance with fury and 164% crit damage before No Quarter. I am dodging for 1256 base damage with 100% crit chance with fury if I land the dodge behind the target and 230% crit damage before No Quarter. Your base damage on Death Blossom is on par with your autoattack damage. The value I am getting from the Critical Strikes line is immense, but with your build, it’s very small. Dropping Critical Strikes to take Trickery just for caltrops on dodge for more bleeds would net you more value, since it plays to the strength of your gear. Tickery also gives you flat dmg increases that improve your condi damage where as nothing in the Critical Strikes line improves your condi damage.

I would also argue if you are going to drop venoms for physical skills, skale venom is better than spider venom for the torment and vulnerability stacks.

Phink.9153:

I might be missing the importance to venomshare though, what does it bring to the table other than a minor 8 sec CD on spider venom?

In the Vale Guardian fight when you are paired with two condi engineers, you are giving them additional condi application on their skills which scales to their gear.

Outside of buffing other condis, venomshare with basilisk will destroy a break bar, since you are buffing all the other group members with a strong CC on hit.

Outside of that, not much more. The zerker meta still lives on in most PvE gameplay, so viper builds are still very niche. I enjoy playing them; they are a lot of fun, but when it takes me twice as long to clear trash, I just end up running staff all the time.

Phink.9153:

I’m not actually that convinced on SA being useful, even in group content if you aren’t running multiple venoms. Really all you pick up is 20% recharge, and a little life siphon. In instanced content, going CS will be a higher DPS increase (I guess I haven’t crunched the numbers) than going venomshare. Unlike the current venomshare build, which alternates between Death Blossom and Lotus..this is an adapted build focusing on poison uptime and dagger autos for DPS.

I might be missing the importance to venomshare though, what does it bring to the table other than a minor 8 sec CD on spider venom?

30 stacks of poison. That’s what it brings to the table. Without VS, Spider Venom deals 6 stacks for 12s if you have 100% poison duration. If you share with 4 other people, you get a 400% increase to the damage of your venoms, in addition to an instant break bar smasher with Basilisk. Shared Spider Venom is the single highest condi DPS source in any possible Thief build. It is an absolute necessity unless you are in a situation where you can’t share.

MadRabbit.3179:

Phink.9153:

I might be missing the importance to venomshare though, what does it bring to the table other than a minor 8 sec CD on spider venom?

In the Vale Guardian fight when you are paired with two condi engineers, you are giving them additional condi application on their skills which scales to their gear.

Outside of buffing other condis, venomshare with basilisk will destroy a break bar, since you are buffing all the other group members with a strong CC on hit.

Shared venoms scale with the stats of the Thief, and they count as your stacks of conditions (so it’s your DPS, not the people you share with). It doesn’t matter if you share with a Viper Engi or Zerk Daredevil, you get the same results.

Zodryn.4216:

MadRabbit.3179:

Phink.9153:

I might be missing the importance to venomshare though, what does it bring to the table other than a minor 8 sec CD on spider venom?

In the Vale Guardian fight when you are paired with two condi engineers, you are giving them additional condi application on their skills which scales to their gear.

Outside of buffing other condis, venomshare with basilisk will destroy a break bar, since you are buffing all the other group members with a strong CC on hit.

Shared venoms scale with the stats of the Thief, and they count as your stacks of conditions (so it’s your DPS, not the people you share with). It doesn’t matter if you share with a Viper Engi or Zerk Daredevil, you get the same results.

Oh wow. I didn’t know that. I stand corrected. I’ll change my opinion then to say viper venomshare has a lot of value in group scenarios, but still very weak solo compared to staff.