Guild Wars 2

At the core of every and I mean EVERY thief build I have seen is the spamming of a certain skill. The builds differ in traits, healing and utility skills but in the end the instructions of how to play the build are always: “…and then spam skill XXX”.

I by no means trying to bash thief players. I am just thinking that because of the way initiative is set up you are basically forced to spam your best skill.

Now I know there are some situations where other skills are used but all other classes force you to use your other skills because of the cooldown. This makes for a more varied gameplay IMHO.

So, is it fair to say that the class mechanic of the thief is officially “spamming”?

AGREED.

It has made me reroll a few times, more interested in the diverse playstyles i see in other classes. I both love and hate initiative — I feel like I’m not mashing because I’m ‘picking’ my abilities, not just mashing what’s off cooldown, but at the same time I’m just mashing whatever is the best option… over, and over, and over. HS. Pistol Whip. Unload. You use a few here and there, situationally, but I don’t like the spammy, boring playstyle.

I’m just sticking to the class because of its mobility.

It’s true our mechanic revolve around spamming a specific skill in certain situations but it will never be “official.” Because of how other classes are, spamming only 1 skill is considered noob and thus forcing thieves to try to combine a variety of skills to be like “pro,” thus killing the initiatives mechanic.

I agree.

I don’t mind having cooldowns or initiative, I love the Thief archetype and will always enjoy playing one. Does it have Shadowstep? Does it have awesome medium/leather armor? Does it have fast and agile abilities? SIGN ME UP

I don’t mind it, I mean you’re given the option to use any of your skills obviously you’re going to use the skill that is best for the situation at the time. It just so happens the bulk of the time it’s 1 particular skill.

I’d still rather mash pistol whip and then have a clutch head shot on a caster too far away or black powder before a big wind-up knockdown hit by a veteran, or using infiltrator’s strike to remove a condition or immobilize (and then pistol whip) a target than using pistol whip on a cooldown, then just mashing autoattack instead until it’s off cooldown.

Having those clutch abilities like black powder, headshot, dancing dagger, cloak and dagger, infiltrator’s arrow, or cluster bomb on demand is much more enjoyable to me than just cycling through cooldowns and autoattacking.

The Initiative mechanic does favor using a single skill repeatedly, yes. Not necessarily the same skill in every situation, but if that skill was the best use of init the first time, it’s probably the best a second/third/etc time too.

I’m not sure that’s particularly worse nor better (in terms of power, skill, or fun), than using your abilities as they come off cooldown, though.

Yep I don’t think that’s gonna change either

The word you’re looking for is “burst”, but if you prefer to say “spamming” that’s up to you.

Yeah, I agree that the Initiative System is kind of flawed in that regard.

The fact that so many taints improve Initiative in some way or another just further encourages the spamming. Heartseeker ist obviously the prime offender in this regard.

I believe it’s a fundamental flaw in the way the class is designed.

I’d much rather have “Stealth” as a resource and manage cooldowns like most other classes.

Hyde.6189:

The word you’re looking for is “burst”, but if you prefer to say “spamming” that’s up to you.

We have a winner.

I must disagree, playing a Thief myself and it’s fun to play.
Spamming Heartseeker is sometimes okay (if the enemy is at low health or you want to close in and doesn’t have another step-power ready), but most of the time I use stealth to get around the enemy and backstabbing … which is really fun imho, as you always have to move around etc.

I do much more damage this way than staying static and spamming Heartseeker.

What I dislike are that the thief doesn’t have a lot of disabling abilities … at least not such that lasts long enough to be worthwhile. Some crippling effects, but most skills only last for a sec or so

i agree with OP as far as some builds go, but those tend to be more cookie cutter

i took ideas from a guy on arena junkies who wrote a very thorough and well explained guide about lots of different thief aspects and it has really helped to open up the possibilities

atm i am built to have 3k power and about 1k condition damage, and i go SB + P/D. my aim is to start the fight using the bow in most situations until i can see how the enemy is playing. unless im against a warrior (or sometimes a mesmer – that SB aoe is helpful against clones) i’ll switch to P/D so i can keep applying lots of bleeds and put out consistant damage by using pistol 1+2. if i need to keep my distance, i use 3.
if i am in a combo field, i use 4 (the bouncing dagger throw) because it is an amazing combo finisher, does good damage with my high power (and might stacking build) and hits 4 ppl for a slow. if i want to use sneak attack i use 5 to get in stealth

steal is a very important skill and once you learn the abilities can change a fight if you steal from the right target

my utilities are 2 venoms, one of the stun breaks or stealth abilities, and obv thieves guild.

i’ve tried to go for a playstyle where i keep doing good damage, have decent durability and can apply a lot of conditions, and its a lot more fun than spam builds

Hyde.6189:

The word you’re looking for is “burst”, but if you prefer to say “spamming” that’s up to you.

I think “burst” was the intended mechanic of the class with “spamming” being the actual result.

I think the people who designed the “burst” thief though fights will be played out something like this:
Jump in/ Steal
Skill A
Quickly followed by skill B
Quickly followed by skill C
Quickly followed by skill D
Thief out of initiative – either the target is dead or you get the hell out of there.

That’s a “burst” class.

Now it all sounds good in theory, but in reality my experience was 99% something like this:
Jump in/ Steal
Skill A
Quickly followed by skill A
Quickly followed by skill A
Quickly followed by skill A
Thief out of initiative – either the target is dead or you get the hell out of there.

As someone already pointed out before in this thread, if skill A is the best skill in a given situation, it will most likely still be the best skill 0.5 seconds later.

In a perfect world, yes… however the original intent probably involved our enemies doing more then just standing there.

In short, stop standing there. We’re extremely squishy and most would find out just how squishy if they didn’t alt-tab to the forums to cry about it every time they see a thief coming for them. (Not saying you OP, just in general.)

Dee Jay.2460:

Yeah, I agree that the Initiative System is kind of flawed in that regard.

The fact that so many taints improve Initiative in some way or another just further encourages the spamming. Heartseeker ist obviously the prime offender in this regard.

I believe it’s a fundamental flaw in the way the class is designed.

I’d much rather have “Stealth” as a resource and manage cooldowns like most other classes.

If cooldown management is what you want then may I suggest one of the 7 other classes in the game. Maybe a dagger elementalist, or maybe a mesmer, they can even stealth.

I prefer being able to shadow step multiple times in a row, or permablind enemies, or interrupt my enemy’s entire skillbar. The whole point is to be able to use the same skill back to back, and sometimes, the situation calls for just that.

Urban Monkey.1580:

At the core of every and I mean EVERY thief build I have seen is the spamming of a certain skill. The builds differ in traits, healing and utility skills but in the end the instructions of how to play the build are always: “…and then spam skill XXX”.

I by no means trying to bash thief players. I am just thinking that because of the way initiative is set up you are basically forced to spam your best skill.

Now I know there are some situations where other skills are used but all other classes force you to use your other skills because of the cooldown. This makes for a more varied gameplay IMHO.

So, is it fair to say that the class mechanic of the thief is officially “spamming”?

as far as damage is concerned this is largely true. every thief weapon set has one skill mainly for damage, the rest for certain situations.

D/D for example,
1-auto attack,
2-heart seeker (only real spammable form of damage),
3-death blossom (only good damage for condition builds, which use it in exclusion to heartseeker),
4-dancing dagger is good damage, but is mainly used for hte bounce/cripple,
5-cloak and dagger does good damage, but is utility to re-enter stealth.
6-then you have backstab for dagger mainhands, not spammable as it requires stealth but there are specs that revolve around it.

this is just one example, with the initiative system we have one real “damage” move typically, and the rest are utility

I think part of what makes a good thief in spvp is knowing when to pace yourself with initiative and when to unload it for the kill.I’ve seen thieves spamming heartseeker on an obisidian flesh-ed elementalist and a blocking warrior.Guess how effective the thief was by the time the def cd was down.

I don’t think initiative is meant to make you only spam one skill,though there is a time for that also.

Here are some examples of skillful “spamming”.Hammer warrior enemy in a teamfight?perma blind him,saving your team from knockdowns.Two enemies trying to stomp a friend?Quickly daze one then switch and daze the other.The thief’s mechanic is only as good as you’re willing to make it imo.

Urban Monkey.1580:

Hyde.6189:

The word you’re looking for is “burst”, but if you prefer to say “spamming” that’s up to you.

I think “burst” was the intended mechanic of the class with “spamming” being the actual result.

I think the people who designed the “burst” thief though fights will be played out something like this:
Jump in/ Steal
Skill A
Quickly followed by skill B
Quickly followed by skill C
Quickly followed by skill D
Thief out of initiative – either the target is dead or you get the hell out of there.

That’s a “burst” class.

Now it all sounds good in theory, but in reality my experience was 99% something like this:
Jump in/ Steal
Skill A
Quickly followed by skill A
Quickly followed by skill A
Quickly followed by skill A
Thief out of initiative – either the target is dead or you get the hell out of there.

As someone already pointed out before in this thread, if skill A is the best skill in a given situation, it will most likely still be the best skill 0.5 seconds later.

No, it was intended that thieves will use the same skill back to back. That is why all the skills on the bar have more utility use rather than just raw damage. They give us out of our 4 non autoattack skills.. 1-2 raw damage skills, and 2-3 situational utility skills.

Dagger/Dagger you get heartseeker and death blossom is your damage skills, heartseeker for single target, death blossom for multiple targets, dancing dagger’s damage did seriously get buffed, I’ll admit but originally it was intended to be used primarily for snaring, not as a ranged attack, used to nail a fleeing target, and cloak and dagger was used to set up a backstab. Arenanet was well aware that most the time a dagger/dagger thief was going to be using heartseeker or death blossom depending on how many targets there were, with situational use of the other 2 skills.

Sword/pistol you have 1 damage skill (pistol whip), and 3 situational skills with low damage. There’s no way they designed it to be used any other way than for you to rely mostly on pistol whip.

Otherwise headshot would have far higher damage (which it should anyway.. it’s the lowest damage skill you have… you’re shooting them in the head for pitiful damage for a third of your initiative, even body shot and auto attack with a pistol do more)

Urban Monkey.1580:

Now it all sounds good in theory, but in reality my experience was 99% something like this..

You’ve played against some unimaginative thieves. Let’s consider, say, a common rotation for my bleed build. It has some repetition but that’s only because certain skills, in any thief build, tend to take a priority. But just as an example:

Steal -. Use stolen skills (potentially hold on if it is something like a fear ability and not Whirling Axes or another damaging skill) →2x Blossoms → Caltrops → Roll for Initiative/Dancing Dagger → Blossom if enemy has purged my bleeds →Auto attack →Heartseeker if and only if needed as an execute.

That’s a rotation with only one prominent skill on repeat and a host of different options if needed. You can even replace the opening Steal use with Shadowstep.

I’ll even offer a S/P rotation that, while it does use Pistol Whip, relies far more on dodging and positioning to buff my basic attack:

Dodge before fight (generating Might and granting damage bonus for not having full Endurance) → Infiltrator’s Strike w/ Devourer Venom →PW (Haste optional), roll through target if Haste isn’t used (stacking might and dropping caltrops to limit enemy mobility) →Auto attack positionally once enemy reaches 50% health (because of rune choice and enhanced critical chance) → Extra Infiltrator’s or use of Steal as needed to prevent escape. Toss PW into rotation again if enemy has healed passed the 50% mark.

That’s a rotation with one big burst skill on repeat but barely because I need to keep my Initiative above six.

Done right, I’m running with Might stacking through a fight at a consistent rate from dodge and sigil crits, three 10% damage increases (Fluid Strikes, First Strikes, and Thief Rune set bonus on flanking attack), an additional 20% boost when Executioner kicks in, and 7% increase critical hit chance with flanking attack. Pistol Whip is there. It’s important, but is it the thing that’s giving me the most damage? Not really because the self root makes it somewhat unreliable. It’s my single strongest ability but not the most important thing affecting my damage output.

Now, your point is still valid to an extent. Initiative, because it is meant for allowing bursts, is a mechanic which partially encourages spamming of high damage skills. But largely because weapon sets contain one major priority skill based on your build. Double Pistols? Unload. Double Dagger? Either Blossom or HS (HS less now with the changes to the skill). For a Stealth build, it’s Cloak and Dagger to backstab. Sword/Pistol has Pistol Whip. Certain builds have abilites which naturally take advantage of the build’s primary states and it’s playstyle.

But even then, you’re better off using various options to control a fight instead of just burning through your resource pool with a single skill.

Note: Edited for formatting.

Thiefs do alot witht heir Heal and utility skills, because lots of them have very short cooldowns, for other classes they have much longer cooldowns mostly on their utility skills. So its not just spamming 1 skill all the time.

Really? I find the thief to be one of the more versatile classes out there. High end PvP is less about dishing out damage and more about setting up ambushes, traps and generally being a thorn in your opponent’s side. I’ve lost count of the amount of times I’ve lured an enemy into a trap and kited them away from an objective whilst my allies secured it for themselves.

typical rotation for my D/D thief goes something like this:

-DB (when i start to burn up some initiative)
-autoattack until lotus strike (for the poison proc)
-DB
-autoattack until LS again

If i am low on endurance sometimes i will throw in a C&D > backstab since i am traited to gain 2 initiative when i stealth, so C&D only actually costs me 4 init if i stealth.

I played a WoW rogue as my main for several years, did a fair amount of raiding too. The resource mechanics are a little similar with regen rates being a little different. One of the things you had to do as a rogue was to keep enough resource available for ‘emergency moves’ like an interrupt. But more importantly you didnt want to let your resource cap out and reach full, because that is wasted dps. So i usually dont let my initiative empty out completely and i also dont let it sit full if i’m dps mode. I may do 2 full autoattack cycles (for 2 lotus strikes) between death blossoms instead of 1 autoattack cycle.

I don’t think people who spam truly understand that there are a multitude of situations that can arise at any given moment. How does everyone always assume there is a 1v1 fight at all times? I rarely get a person locked to myself without a reinforcement or 5 showing up randomly. I usually save a bit so I can C&D and gtfo.

If you jump in and spam Heartseeker because its ‘The best ability at the time and .5 seconds later it is still the same’ you are either lazy or don’t understand the options in full.

Many skills are dependent upon the class you are playing against as well as their current hp, distance from you, how many others are around said target, and how much burst you are really looking to do (Don’t tell me burst is always priority because you will never fully burst a guardian down in 1 pool of initiative), blah blah blah. Its obvious that a lot of people have this 1v1 mentality and ‘Theory crafting’ BS, but that is seldom the case in SPvP or WvW. You may kill 1 or 2 people here and there just running in and spamming heartseeker before you inevitably go down because you cant escape, but that is not a good use of your skills and you can be more efficient.

My combo usually when fighting heavier classes is to use more death blossom due to conditions doing unmitigated damage. I tend to focus more on keeping ~6-9 stacks of bleed on and using more of a hit and run style to keep invisible and stacking some vulnerability, where as my lighter fights tend to have more focus on heartseeker and just more movement. I still use cloak and dagger on everything because I feel stealth adds a bit of confusion to the fights and helps a ton in group situations when people keep losing targeting on you.

The key is though that it is rare ever that I have a chance to effectively spam 1 skill. Exceptions to this ‘no spamming’ rule are primarily that I am super low HP and have a few initiative, I’ll try and get as much out as possible before my imminent certain death or if there are a large pack of close together enemies I will leap through a few times with Death Blossom to try and front load as much damage as possible. This second instance, I usually plan an escape route by swapping to shortbow and getting out.

The fact is that Death Blossom is for group packs and condition stacking and Heartseeker is for targets (with the recent notes) below 50% hp. You have to get targets to below 50% before it is effective in the slightest which warrants use of other skills 50% of the time. Anything at a distance will need to use something that leaps you or snares your target. Anything with high armor/hp will need some working over with other skills until it hits that 50% point.

TL:DR; Heartseeker is only good on targets <50% hp and gets better <25%. Death Blossom is better for stacking potential damage and unmitigated damage, and stealth has utility to keep you alive. You need to save initiative for those ‘Oh crap’ situations. If you don’t use these all when they are supposed to be used, you are missing out.