As things stand, I might stick with the daredevil. But, the build in PVE that I am going to try out is the following:
Deadly Arts: Mug, Panic Strike, Executioner
Critical Strikes: Twin Fangs, Practiced Tolerance, No Quarter
Deadeye: Iron Sight, Silent Scope, Be Quick or Be Killed
Full Berserker on everything. Scholar Runes, Sigil of Force + Sigil of Air.
Dagger + Pistol, Rifle.
Signet of Malice
Shadow Flare
Signet of Agility
Assassin’s Signet
Basilisk Venom
The trait designs for Deadeye are largely PVP based, and as such there isn’t much to choose from in a PVE environment:
At the adept tier, Revealed Malice will be cumbersome to use, and often not really worth it. One in the Chamber may be good, but I will need experience with the stolen skills that Deadeye gets. For now, I will take Iron Sights, because it is simple and it always works.
At the master tier we have better options. Silent Scope is able to push the the rifle into 98% crit range without food, which is pretty good. In group environments it isn’t as good, since constantly swapping between kneel and stand is cumbersome and I’ll be getting more crit chance from team buffs. Unforgiving is also a decent option, since a 1 second stun has a lot of use against bosses. If Unforgiving works as I think it will, then each time Mark recharges I can stun the exact same target over and over again. Peripheral Vision is the wild card, because again I don’t know all of the mark skills.
At the grandmaster tier, Fire for Effect is the wild card. The big debate is between Maleficent Seven and BQoBK. The whole reason to take the deadeye in PVE is for the Malice buff. 15% for all damage is substantial, and there is some wisdom in getting those malice stacks as fast as possible. With Maleficent Seven, you can get a 21% damage buff after 7 seconds of combat. However, my experience in most of PVE has shown that enemies simply do not live for 7 seconds. BQoBK facilitates extremely fast kills, and also provides a nice buff when teamed with a Chrono. This makes BQoBK the superior trait, except in circumstances when you are fighting against a champion without team quickness.
For utilities, the signets are obvious choices. The remaining skills depends on what you want.
Shadow Flare is a high damage pulsing AoE. Against small groups it is good, but against a fully marked champion it is even better. It is the simple option. Though if you want CC, you’ll have to choose between Binding Shadow and Shadow Gust. I would recommend Binding, because the Knockback from gust will interrupt enemy placement, and Binding also does more damage. Mercy is nearly useless, and for a stun break I’d recommend a vanilla thief skill instead. Malicious Restoration is also nearly useless, as thieves have better heal skills natively. Shadow Meld is pretty cool as an elite, but CC is far more needed than stealth in PVE.
Overall, I’m certain that Daredevil will be better in PVE than the Deadeye. While I will be wandering around the desert humming the Mission Impossible theme for awhile, the Daredevil has too many advantages. DD has Havoc Mastery and Bound for damage bonuses, it damages on dodge, it has great mobility, excellent endurance regeneration, and the utilities are pretty useful. The Deadeye is immobile, the utilities aren’t that good, the damage buff only works against 1 target and it takes 10 seconds to get the full 15%. The steal skills are still a wild card, and the high range of the rifle is something that just isn’t needed in PVE. To its advantage, quick fingers will let BQoBK chew through countless mobs with near permanent quickness and high buffs.
I don’t have opinions. I only have facts I can’t adequately prove.
