Guild Wars 2

Kocoff.7582:

That is my point actually, I don’t really see anything to change for Deadly Arts, but there is always room for improvement in terms of synergy, and since you did good job with those suggest I wanted pick on your mind even more lol.

But your concept of balance is definitely in par with mine. We definitely don’t want to push, because let’s face it, we want to have fun as much as our enemies.

Hi, so I’m not the guy but I have a few ideas about Deadly Arts. As with most other traitlines we have, there just isn’t anything better to take than what we currently do…so some competition will do well.

Dagger Training: add Reduce Initiative costs of Dagger skills by 20%. All classes have some traits that reduce weapon cooldowns…this would be our version I guess…maybe a bit too strong? (also useful in PvE)

Trapper’s Respite: (Drop trap at beginning of heal) Triggered Traps heal you for [some amount].

Deadly Trapper: add Traps can be placed at range. I think all trap skills should have a trait like this.

Revealed Training: I know this has PvE applications, but it’s honestly not that great of a trait…not sure how to rework it though…might just need to be replaced with something more interesting.

Potent Poison → Chemical Burns: Applying Poison applies Burning (x seconds). Seems thematic enough for me…gives thief access to a powerful condition, and numbers can be tweaked accordingly.

So these are my ideas. I tried to keep them more or less toned down…thoughts?

T raw.4658:

Looks like i’ma have to spell it out for you and just address your entire stance with this once post.

Team Fighting Ability was the sacrifice that thieves made for their mobility. Not 1v1 capabilities.

Well I’d argue that we just gave up Fighting Ability in general for our mobility…or at least it was taken from us.

T raw.4658:

So when you are considering whatever it is you are considering go back to that statement.

Now we will inevitably get the response of “Give up mobility for Team Fighting Ability” and I will remind you that this is a thief….You Can’t Give It Team Fighting Ability.

It’s the way the class is made and functions at a base level. There are zero boons, invulns, blocks, group heals, water fields, good condi removal, etc. The undisputed fact is the thief class is the absolute squishiest class in this game. The dev time required to completely remake and balance the thief from the ground up isn’t happening at this point in time in a game’s life. If this was alpha circa 2012 yeah i’d say go for it….but its 2015 3yrs after release.

Yes so even the new touted Daredevil spec will fail to give thieves sustain or group fight ability due to the way a thief is built at the base level, but we are fine with that. We signed on to thief knowing this and willingly accepted it. Thieves figured out ways to function with in a group setting utilizing their special skill sets, but here we are horribly UP with only Shortbow 5 keeping us meta. Now I read people want to nerf Inf Arrow……lol

OK…yea…you’re right about the team fight capability…but if thief was able to get around the map and still be able to fight people evenly 1v1, don’t you think that just having a thief around is extremely oppressive for the opponents? I almost want to say that this was how we were before…and that is why we are where we are now. You want to go back, and I get that. It was fun for us to play back then…but try to understand, it’s not a lot of fun for other players. When I think about it, I feel like Thief was a HUGE contributor to the evolution of the Celestial meta that we see today. Why? Because we completely destroyed any competing DPS class. You are asking the devs to put us back in that position…and I don’t agree with that.

As far as dev time goes, all we can do is wait. All I will do is do my best to remain positive. There is no use in making ourselves feel worse than we already do.

blarghhrrkblah.3412:

Kocoff.7582:

That is my point actually, I don’t really see anything to change for Deadly Arts, but there is always room for improvement in terms of synergy, and since you did good job with those suggest I wanted pick on your mind even more lol.

But your concept of balance is definitely in par with mine. We definitely don’t want to push, because let’s face it, we want to have fun as much as our enemies.

Hi, so I’m not the guy but I have a few ideas about Deadly Arts. As with most other traitlines we have, there just isn’t anything better to take than what we currently do…so some competition will do well.

Dagger Training: add Reduce Initiative costs of Dagger skills by 20%. All classes have some traits that reduce weapon cooldowns…this would be our version I guess…maybe a bit too strong? (also useful in PvE)

Trapper’s Respite: (Drop trap at beginning of heal) Triggered Traps heal you for [some amount].

Deadly Trapper: add Traps can be placed at range. I think all trap skills should have a trait like this.

Revealed Training: I know this has PvE applications, but it’s honestly not that great of a trait…not sure how to rework it though…might just need to be replaced with something more interesting.

Potent Poison -> Chemical Burns: Applying Poison applies Burning (x seconds). Seems thematic enough for me…gives thief access to a powerful condition, and numbers can be tweaked accordingly.

So these are my ideas. I tried to keep them more or less toned down…thoughts?

Kind of you good sir. It’s not bad.

I thought of something similar to Potent Poison and Chemical Burns, which is quite interesting btw.

I thought of “Ardent Concoction” Which applies burning when the Thief applies Blind. Anyways, i thought the similitude was funny.

- I liked Dagger Training a lot it has a wider and more beneficial use than increasing the chance of poisoning.
- I agree that traps should have a targeted aspect to it, I am sure the Dragonhunters are facing the same problem. They have a lot less little mobility, they must be screaming at this too lol.
-Same for revealed training, the current one is garbage and so it leaves space for a lot of imagination, but i definitely see a powerful defensive trait taking its spot.

Something like " Toughness +x for each target in your range . Being Revealed cleans conditions."

Thanks for sharing!

Kocoff.7582:

blarghhrrkblah.3412:

Kocoff.7582:

That is my point actually, I don’t really see anything to change for Deadly Arts, but there is always room for improvement in terms of synergy, and since you did good job with those suggest I wanted pick on your mind even more lol.

But your concept of balance is definitely in par with mine. We definitely don’t want to push, because let’s face it, we want to have fun as much as our enemies.

Hi, so I’m not the guy but I have a few ideas about Deadly Arts. As with most other traitlines we have, there just isn’t anything better to take than what we currently do…so some competition will do well.

Dagger Training: add Reduce Initiative costs of Dagger skills by 20%. All classes have some traits that reduce weapon cooldowns…this would be our version I guess…maybe a bit too strong? (also useful in PvE)

Trapper’s Respite: (Drop trap at beginning of heal) Triggered Traps heal you for [some amount].

Deadly Trapper: add Traps can be placed at range. I think all trap skills should have a trait like this.

Revealed Training: I know this has PvE applications, but it’s honestly not that great of a trait…not sure how to rework it though…might just need to be replaced with something more interesting.

Potent Poison -> Chemical Burns: Applying Poison applies Burning (x seconds). Seems thematic enough for me…gives thief access to a powerful condition, and numbers can be tweaked accordingly.

So these are my ideas. I tried to keep them more or less toned down…thoughts?

Kind of you good sir. It’s not bad.

I thought of something similar to Potent Poison and Chemical Burns, which is quite interesting btw.

I thought of “Ardent Concoction” Which applies burning when the Thief applies Blind. Anyways, i thought the similitude was funny.

- I liked Dagger Training a lot it has a wider and more beneficial use than increasing the chance of poisoning.
- I agree that traps should have a targeted aspect to it, I am sure the Dragonhunters are facing the same problem. They have a lot less little mobility, they must be screaming at this too lol.
-Same for revealed training, the current one is garbage and so it leaves space for a lot of imagination, but i definitely see a powerful defensive trait taking its spot.

Something like " Toughness +x for each target in your range . Being Revealed cleans conditions."

Thanks for sharing!

I think some of it depends on the developers and where they want to take Deadly Arts. Deadly Arts has found sort of a unique place being a bit of a hybrid Power/Condition trait line which is a bit unusual, as usually Critical and Conditions are merged and not power, which makes DA both interesting and a bit confusing on intentions.

I will say, though, I actually do not think giving Thief burn is the answer. if anything, you guys should be praised for being the only class in the game without access to it. Burning needs toned down and other conditions actually need to be brought up a bit. Not sure how common knowledge it is, but Burning is roughly the second easiest condition to stack (Bleeding being #1) and deals damage roughly 5:1 or 4:1 (depending on codition damage levels) to other conditions. That’s HUGE and definitely needs some re-balancing. This would help a lot in many aspects of the game, though.

I always thought it’d be cool if they left DA as this somewhat ‘hybrid’ playstyle and had traits work more closely to their poison application. And a quick note, because initiative costs are so numerically low, 20% doesn’t work out very well. I’ll address an alternative below.

Some rough suggestions being:
Dagger Training: All dagger attacks have a 25% chance to apply 3 seconds of poison. Initiative generates naturally 10% faster while wielding a dagger (main or offhand).(Reason: I bumped the duration due to changing Potent Poison. Also, as this is the power/condition line, I don’t necessarily feel like it should nest crit-mandatory traits and while using dagger, should be more about quick attacks to apply poison. Hint hint, Carrion.)

Trapper’s Respite: Honestly, doesn’t need much changed. The trap it triggers needs a shorter cooldown by itself, which would make this trait more worthy of using. To avoid absuse, I do not feel like ALL heals should place the trap at the start, just when the heal is effectively “used” it should place it. And by this, I do mean it should happen at the start of Withdraw. It’s the only one that realistically hurts placement.

Deadly Trapper: I’m honestly just not sure. Might is in the right place, being a power/condition hybrid spec. I think the issue with the trait lies MORE in the traps themselves, but I could be wrong. Also not too sure about throwable traps. It could work, but they seem to want to move away from that direction, so it might be unreasonable to suggest.

Panic Strike: Here’s what I’d do, but again, it might be questionable to some thieves. I would rename it “Paralysis Poisons”. Using the method of Chronomancer’s critical hits, I’d make it "Every 5th poison you apply (not necessarily to a single target, a stacking self-buff in the same manner), cripples the target for 3 seconds. Poisoning a target immobilizes them for 1.5 seconds (20 second ICD, no stack requirement). (Reason: This allows the trait to be used more through the fight, but a little less crazy immobilize all at once. It also prevents the trait from being wasted on warriors with Berserker stance up because it will not effectively be poisoning. At a basic level, this means your first stealth on entry would immobilize the target, giving a good opening set up, and the cripple adds to condition coverage and keeps a target from escaping. Overall, its just more thematic and fun and requires more skill to use. Depending on how much harder this makes the trait to use it could possibly even stay at 2 seconds, numbers obviously would be in flux. Let me know what you think.

Potent Poison: It’s a bit boring. As the hybrid tree, I think it would be interesting to make it something like “Fast Acting Poisons (a better name?): Inflicting Poison also deals initial damage (probably around 250 base per stack applied, scaling with power and can critically hit), and increases poison duration by 20%.” (Reason: It lends to that idea of a hybrid condition/power tree, and gives a unique involvement with poisons that benefits both stat focuses. I’m not sure I’d want to keep the damage of poison boost because, ideally, they will bump the damage of poison across the board, and I’m not sure it would be necessary. Overall, I think this could make for a fun trait for both pvp and pve when properly tuned. Adds some AoE damage to Shortbow#4, too.)

These are just some ideas to fit the theme of the trait line and maybe make better use of poison and open up some diversity. Numbers might be a mess, but I’m more focused on the overall concept and play.

Let me know what you think.

blarghhrrkblah.3412:

T raw.4658:

Looks like i’ma have to spell it out for you and just address your entire stance with this once post.

Team Fighting Ability was the sacrifice that thieves made for their mobility. Not 1v1 capabilities.

Well I’d argue that we just gave up Fighting Ability in general for our mobility…or at least it was taken from us.

T raw.4658:

So when you are considering whatever it is you are considering go back to that statement.

Now we will inevitably get the response of “Give up mobility for Team Fighting Ability” and I will remind you that this is a thief….You Can’t Give It Team Fighting Ability.

It’s the way the class is made and functions at a base level. There are zero boons, invulns, blocks, group heals, water fields, good condi removal, etc. The undisputed fact is the thief class is the absolute squishiest class in this game. The dev time required to completely remake and balance the thief from the ground up isn’t happening at this point in time in a game’s life. If this was alpha circa 2012 yeah i’d say go for it….but its 2015 3yrs after release.

Yes so even the new touted Daredevil spec will fail to give thieves sustain or group fight ability due to the way a thief is built at the base level, but we are fine with that. We signed on to thief knowing this and willingly accepted it. Thieves figured out ways to function with in a group setting utilizing their special skill sets, but here we are horribly UP with only Shortbow 5 keeping us meta. Now I read people want to nerf Inf Arrow……lol

OK…yea…you’re right about the team fight capability…but if thief was able to get around the map and still be able to fight people evenly 1v1, don’t you think that just having a thief around is extremely oppressive for the opponents? I almost want to say that this was how we were before…and that is why we are where we are now. You want to go back, and I get that. It was fun for us to play back then…but try to understand, it’s not a lot of fun for other players. When I think about it, I feel like Thief was a HUGE contributor to the evolution of the Celestial meta that we see today. Why? Because we completely destroyed any competing DPS class. You are asking the devs to put us back in that position…and I don’t agree with that.

As far as dev time goes, all we can do is wait. All I will do is do my best to remain positive. There is no use in making ourselves feel worse than we already do.

First lets get this out of the way. Thieves are NOT responsible for the Cele Meta. Anet stupidly buffing the amulet is.

Being able to 1v1 is not the same as being OP 1v1. Cele Necro is OP 1v1. Rangers abusing taunts is OP 1v1.

Getting thief to a 40/60 ratio in 1v1s with all professions is HARDLY creating a monster. Even getting a thief to a 50/50 1v1 ratio with all professions fails to create a monster. A monster would be a 60/40 to 80/20 1v1 ratio for a thief….that’s a monster.

So no I don’t think that scenario I’ve outlined is oppressive. It would require each engagement’s outcome to be determined by skill..OMGWTFKINDACONCEPT!!!

You win the point by being a better player. If you can’t rely on your own skill you lose. Fair is fair unfortunately that has not been the case.

@blargh & Ronpierce, glad you made some suggestions.

Maybe, it’s the power/condi hybrid line that bothers me the most. I know I may be exagerating here, but half from both sides of power and condi end being inefficient. I like the concept of specialization, and it should focus solely on one.

Let’s face it Deadly Arts takes into account traps, poisons and raw damage, that’s just inneficient.

So.. Your take on Dagger training is interesting, but I prefer Blargh’s. Personally, I would rather have my init costs reduced on dagger than have init regen.

Your suggestion on Panic Strike would be much more useful for sure. the 5 stacks also provides an improved ICD (meaning you could modify with quickness, get slowed or even simply missing the hits), to the points where the 20 second ICD wouldn’t even be necessary especially if it provides just cripple. ok maybe 10 sec. It is definitely a nice one.

You are right, Potent Poison is tricky. Your suggestion, I feel would be quite difficult to adjust.

I was thinking maybe it could “tick” faster. It ticks twice as fast, but keeps the duration. It essentially doubles the damage of the poison, but is not modified by anything.

Should SB #2 and #4 be turned into “improved Trickshots” where it would become “explosive arrow” and “poison arrow” respectively. This could complete ignore the “travelling distance” everyone is mumbling about.

Also Ronpierce, Sorry I can’t help you on the Necro lol. Maybe you’ ll join us when things get better for us!

Kocoff.7582:

@blargh & Ronpierce, glad you made some suggestions.

Maybe, it’s the power/condi hybrid line that bothers me the most. I know I may be exagerating here, but half from both sides of power and condi end being inefficient. I like the concept of specialization, and it should focus solely on one.

Let’s face it Deadly Arts takes into account traps, poisons and raw damage, that’s just inneficient.

So.. Your take on Dagger training is interesting, but I prefer Blargh’s. Personally, I would rather have my init costs reduced on dagger than have init regen.

Your suggestion on Panic Strike would be much more useful for sure. the 5 stacks also provides an improved ICD (meaning you could modify with quickness, get slowed or even simply missing the hits), to the points where the 20 second ICD wouldn’t even be necessary especially if it provides just cripple. ok maybe 10 sec. It is definitely a nice one.

You are right, Potent Poison is tricky. Your suggestion, I feel would be quite difficult to adjust.

I was thinking maybe it could “tick” faster. It ticks twice as fast, but keeps the duration. It essentially doubles the damage of the poison, but is not modified by anything.

Should SB #2 and #4 be turned into “improved Trickshots” where it would become “explosive arrow” and “poison arrow” respectively. This could complete ignore the “travelling distance” everyone is mumbling about.

Also Ronpierce, Sorry I can’t help you on the Necro lol. Maybe you’ ll join us when things get better for us!

Well the problem, and I’ll make it easier to understand, is with costs between 3 and 5 initiative, you will only ever see a cost reduction of 0 or 1 with a 20% cost reduction. Unless they round up to the nearest whole number, in which case you reduce all costs by 1 (which is not 20% across the board, it’s 33% on a 3 costing ability). It just simply doesn’t work. Beyond that, because initiative comes at a constant flat rate, any initiative you drop, the skill becomes available vastly more often. For example, you might be able to cast something that costs 3 initiative about 7-8 times before it beckons unavailable, you can cast something with 2 initiative upwards 12-15 times. The usage difference is huge. An initiative regeneration rate or energy gained is much more reliable as a means of adjusting energy usage because it doesn’t result in multiplicative increase in efficiency. You will likely never see a cost decrease trait unless it’s a GM trait that is intended to create a very specific type of build, and even then, incredibly not likely. Sure it “sounds” better, of course, but mathematically, you just can’t do it.

As for the poison and hybrid aspect of Deadly Arts, I think it’s intentional. It might feel wired but I get the impression it’s meant to be used with Rampager’s/carrion/sinister. As weird as a power/condition hybrid may seem, it’s fairly obvious that is their overall goal, especially considering the GM minor which increases power damage dealt by 10% when the enemy had a condition, and the tree has a total of 30% potential damage increase, meaning it isn’t intended as a condition-only or specific trait line. If I had to guess, the poison traits were likely intended to give thieves some hybrid potential, increase stat diversity and allow condition Thieves to find some synergy in the trait line (ensuring it wasn’t 100% useless for condition focus builds).

ronpierce.2760:

I will say, though, I actually do not think giving Thief burn is the answer. if anything, you guys should be praised for being the only class in the game without access to it. Burning needs toned down and other conditions actually need to be brought up a bit. Not sure how common knowledge it is, but Burning is roughly the second easiest condition to stack (Bleeding being #1) and deals damage roughly 5:1 or 4:1 (depending on condition damage levels) to other conditions. That’s HUGE and definitely needs some re-balancing. This would help a lot in many aspects of the game, though.
…
Potent Poison: It’s a bit boring. As the hybrid tree, I think it would be interesting to make it something like “Fast Acting Poisons (a better name?): Inflicting Poison also deals initial damage (probably around 250 base per stack applied, scaling with power and can critically hit), and increases poison duration by 20%.” (Reason: It lends to that idea of a hybrid condition/power tree, and gives a unique involvement with poisons that benefits both stat focuses. I’m not sure I’d want to keep the damage of poison boost because, ideally, they will bump the damage of poison across the board, and I’m not sure it would be necessary. Overall, I think this could make for a fun trait for both pvp and pve when properly tuned. Adds some AoE damage to Shortbow#4, too.)

This is fair. I do agree that burning is too strong right now, but I don’t see us being the only class without burning to be something that is praiseworthy. That said, since I think of poison to be a more debilitating condition, it would be cool to have more debilitating conditions added on by poison…such as, say, chill…something like applying poison applies chill…similar to Lotus Poison.

I do like the idea of having Poison deal it’s damage faster…but I think having a hybrid of power and condition damage is not going to work very well since we will not be able to survive long enough to deal substantial damage. Since poison should be a longer lasting, lower damage condition, what if the trait “Fast Acting Venom” reduced the duration of your poisons by, say, 20%, but boosted the damage by 50%? Probably the numbers need some work, but the idea is the same. I guess this would also mean that our poison applying skills will need some reworking, but everything we’re suggesting is a pretty rigorous rework anyway.

ronpierce.2760:

I always thought it’d be cool if they left DA as this somewhat ‘hybrid’ playstyle and had traits work more closely to their poison application. And a quick note, because initiative costs are so numerically low, 20% doesn’t work out very well. I’ll address an alternative below.

Some rough suggestions being:
Dagger Training: All dagger attacks have a 25% chance to apply 3 seconds of poison. Initiative generates naturally 10% faster while wielding a dagger (main or offhand).

So the reason I don’t like this (initiative regen with dagger) is because 10% more initiative means 1 ini every 10 seconds. We have a Signet that does this, and maybe it’s just me, but it feels VERY insignificant. I do agree that trying to cut the ini cost by % is a bit weird due to smaller numbers, so what if dagger training just reduced ini costs by a flat 1 ini per dagger skill?

ronpierce.2760:

Deadly Trapper: I’m honestly just not sure. Might is in the right place, being a power/condition hybrid spec. I think the issue with the trait lies MORE in the traps themselves, but I could be wrong. Also not too sure about throwable traps. It could work, but they seem to want to move away from that direction, so it might be unreasonable to suggest.

Yea…I’m honestly not sure what to do with traps (I don’t use them). The goal is to make it fun for the thief to use them, but not be terribly annoying for opponents to deal with. I think an issue right now is that the traps themselves don’t do enough, so I agree that the traps themselves need work.

ronpierce.2760:

Panic Strike: Here’s what I’d do, but again, it might be questionable to some thieves. I would rename it “Paralysis Poisons”. Using the method of Chronomancer’s critical hits, I’d make it "Every 5th poison you apply (not necessarily to a single target, a stacking self-buff in the same manner), cripples the target for 3 seconds. Poisoning a target immobilizes them for 1.5 seconds (20 second ICD, no stack requirement). (Reason: This allows the trait to be used more through the fight, but a little less crazy immobilize all at once. It also prevents the trait from being wasted on warriors with Berserker stance up because it will not effectively be poisoning. At a basic level, this means your first stealth on entry would immobilize the target, giving a good opening set up, and the cripple adds to condition coverage and keeps a target from escaping. Overall, its just more thematic and fun and requires more skill to use. Depending on how much harder this makes the trait to use it could possibly even stay at 2 seconds, numbers obviously would be in flux. Let me know what you think.

I actually do like this. However, a problem I see is that it appears like there is synergy between this and Dagger Training, but in reality, we are losing control of when to apply our immobilize when we take the two together. It’s partly to do with the fact that each hit with the dagger only has a chance to apply poison.

I’ve got some things that need to be done atm so I’ll just leave this here for now. Thanks!

blarghhrrkblah.3412:

Thief is a class where the skilled player can choose to only engage in favorable conditions, and disengage from all unfavorable ones. Is that balanced? Maybe that is what the thief flavor is supposed to be but in terms of game balance that is NOT fun to play against. If we are to become reasonable fighters, we’re going to have to give up something, and that something will probably have to be our ridiculous mobility.

blarghhrrkblah.3412:

As it stand, any good thief can basically escape any situation he finds himself in, provided he does not commit anything to that fight. The ability to decide any terms of engagement, whether on an enemy or by an enemy on the thief, is an incredibly powerful ability. Yes thief cannot fight worth kitten right now, but they can indeed run like hell.

I believe each of those quotes holds two very important points, but I feel the first ends with something not completely accurate.

First, I would say that the ability to choose the terms of engagement and disengagement (and even avoidance) is the heart and soul of what it means to be a Thief. To lose that is to lose the very essence of the profession. The capability is sometimes due to stealth, other times mobility. It really depends on the weapon set/build. But it is most important to not lose that.

Secondly, it’s true the Thief can’t hold its own in a fight right now. It’s glass, but it’s not a cannon. And I believe that’s where the inaccuracy comes. I think the Thief has already given up too much fighting capability for the mobility it has. Even if it was overpowered at one time, the pendulum has shifted to the other extreme. So I don’t believe that is a need to give anything up for at least a decent upgrade to sustainability.

I understand it’s no fun when you feel helpless because you cannot see your opponent, or even if you can see him, but you just cannot get close enough to hit him. But it’s also no fun at all to know that even if you build to full damage potential and get the drop on your foe, scoring hit after hit, you’re most likely not going to break though his defenses enough before he recovers or gets one solid blow in that will leave you on the ground. And if you don’t build for full damage, your defenses still won’t be strong enough to survive a battle of attrition.

By no means am I a great Thief. But I’ve attempted to run without stealth. I’ve tried full power builds, I’ve tried full crit builds, I’ve tried more balanced builds. I’ve run with a utility bar with 4 stunbreaks and 4 condi-removals. On glass builds, I don’t need that many stunbreaks because I’ll already be dead after one stun or maybe two. On more sustainable builds, I don’t have enough condi-removal to be able to maintain pressure, especially against certain builds.

When my own stuns affect me, when I catch on fire because I’m being blocked, when I take damage because my attack actually hit like it was supposed to, when I catch someone off guard and nearly down them, then they pop an invulnerability and barrage me with no fear for what seems like an eternity… well, that’s no fun either. As a Thief, I am not rewarded enough when I do attack successfully, I am not rewarded enough when I am successful at evading, and I am even punished when I do apply pressure like I’m supposed to! Who thought of that?

Honestly, the trait that best describes the style a Thief should live by is “No Quarter.” Yet when we attack aggressively, we are punished for it, and we don’t have the means to survive. A melee class with little health and toughness, but not enough punch. We are like a glass pitcher fighting a stone. It doesn’t matter if the stone hits the pitcher or the pitcher hits the stone, it’s going to be bad for the pitcher.

What can fix the Thief? I don’t really know. But I do know that it needs buffs, not nerfs. Even if its the ability to take a few more hits without a decrease in our damage output. Playing a game like Ninja Gaiden can teach you that just one or two hits can mean the difference between success and game over. But I think one issue is that people try to balance the Thief like they would every other profession. But it is unique, so it doesn’t work well. It needs to have its own rules. Some things may seem crazy in theory (both good and bad), but they may work out perfectly.

Kageseigi.2150:

I believe each of those quotes holds two very important points, but I feel the first ends with something not completely accurate.

First, I would say that the ability to choose the terms of engagement and disengagement (and even avoidance) is the heart and soul of what it means to be a Thief. To lose that is to lose the very essence of the profession. The capability is sometimes due to stealth, other times mobility. It really depends on the weapon set/build. But it is most important to not lose that.

Secondly, it’s true the Thief can’t hold its own in a fight right now. It’s glass, but it’s not a cannon. And I believe that’s where the inaccuracy comes. I think the Thief has already given up too much fighting capability for the mobility it has. Even if it was overpowered at one time, the pendulum has shifted to the other extreme. So I don’t believe that is a need to give anything up for at least a decent upgrade to sustainability.

I understand it’s no fun when you feel helpless because you cannot see your opponent, or even if you can see him, but you just cannot get close enough to hit him. But it’s also no fun at all to know that even if you build to full damage potential and get the drop on your foe, scoring hit after hit, you’re most likely not going to break though his defenses enough before he recovers or gets one solid blow in that will leave you on the ground. And if you don’t build for full damage, your defenses still won’t be strong enough to survive a battle of attrition.

By no means am I a great Thief. But I’ve attempted to run without stealth. I’ve tried full power builds, I’ve tried full crit builds, I’ve tried more balanced builds. I’ve run with a utility bar with 4 stunbreaks and 4 condi-removals. On glass builds, I don’t need that many stunbreaks because I’ll already be dead after one stun or maybe two. On more sustainable builds, I don’t have enough condi-removal to be able to maintain pressure, especially against certain builds.

When my own stuns affect me, when I catch on fire because I’m being blocked, when I take damage because my attack actually hit like it was supposed to, when I catch someone off guard and nearly down them, then they pop an invulnerability and barrage me with no fear for what seems like an eternity… well, that’s no fun either. As a Thief, I am not rewarded enough when I do attack successfully, I am not rewarded enough when I am successful at evading, and I am even punished when I do apply pressure like I’m supposed to! Who thought of that?

Honestly, the trait that best describes the style a Thief should live by is “No Quarter.” Yet when we attack aggressively, we are punished for it, and we don’t have the means to survive. A melee class with little health and toughness, but not enough punch. We are like a glass pitcher fighting a stone. It doesn’t matter if the stone hits the pitcher or the pitcher hits the stone, it’s going to be bad for the pitcher.

What can fix the Thief? I don’t really know. But I do know that it needs buffs, not nerfs. Even if its the ability to take a few more hits without a decrease in our damage output. Playing a game like Ninja Gaiden can teach you that just one or two hits can mean the difference between success and game over. But I think one issue is that people try to balance the Thief like they would every other profession. But it is unique, so it doesn’t work well. It needs to have its own rules. Some things may seem crazy in theory (both good and bad), but they may work out perfectly.

You have good points, and I agree that thief needs buffs and not nerfs. I am completely fine with being wrong about this. My foremost goal is to get good discussion going and just get SOMETHING to change in our favor. But anyway, let me explain my reasoning behind this. I sent this in a pm to T Raw earlier (and I’m pretty sure he will have some nice disagreements for me when he gets to it) but consider the thief’s ability to kill.

Assume that it is something like 40/60. 40% of the time, thief will get the kill. Great. But what about the 60% of the time? Only two things can happen if we don’t kill someone. We run away, or we die. Considering our current ability to run away, I would say that of the 60% of the time we don’t kill, 40% of it is a disengage (usually on our part), and 20% is our death. Now put these numbers side by side…40 kill/40 disengage/20 death. Using these rough numbers, you can see that we are far more likely to kill than to die. Of course our current numbers are more like 10/70/20 or something around that, but the point is that we have far more escapability than we should if we are to be capable killers. This is why I think that our escapability (thereby our mobility) needs to be scaled down.

As for what can fix thief…I don’t know either. This is why I want to discuss these topics. I admit that I am pretty stubborn, and it’s going to take a lot more than simply telling me I’m wrong to convince me that I am.

Also another thing I want to address…other classes being OP right now shouldn’t mean that we get balanced around them. I get that everyone is strong against us (or in general) right now, but to maintain fun gameplay, I think that the power level can’t be too high.

PS: As a personal request…I feel like we are kind of derailing this thread a bit, so if anyone would like to continue this discussion, please either pm me or make a new thread. Thanks!

I have 5 level 80 characters and started up my thief and while I am enjoying thief a lot, it feels incredibly limited. It doesn’t look like DD will be much of an upgrade in comparison to what other professions are getting either. I hope thief can get a little more attention than, say the elementalist.

I really want to love this profession!