Guild Wars 2

I wanted to take a moment to highlight some of the issues I’ve observed about the Thief class over the recent weeks.

To set them apart from other classes, Thieves have a unique mechanic called Initiative that replaces the classic cooldown system. Essentially, rather than weapon skills having a direct cooldown, they cost a certain amount of Initiative, which in turn regenerates at an even pace.

For multiple reasons however, this mechanic is fundamentally flawed.

1. The Initiative system is designed to replace the cooldown system. However the taint and skill system add multiple mechanics on how to mitigate the limitation provided by Initiative.

2. Since all these taints and abilities combined are very effective at negating the initiative system, this allows thieves to design builds evolving around spaming certain abilities (like Pistol Whip). Abilities that for balance reasons, would really require a cooldown.

3. Taints already dictate which of the already limited number of abilities are your preferred source of damage. You’re specced into Condition Damage as a Dagger/Dagger Thief? Well then LDBis your only significant source of damage.

With such limited weapon combinations available, combined with the strengths added by the taint system and gear selection, it only leaves a very limited amount of effective attacks.

90% of the time I find myself spaming the same ability over and over again, because the Initiative system is so easily circumvented and because, due to my spec, I only really have one effective attack per weapon combo.

While I enjoy some aspects of the class, I can’t get over the feeling that many of the core mechanics are just fundamentally flawed. The Initiative system for example is just something that will never feel balanced and fun.

what your post boils down to is “i dislike how thief works, and want it to work more like the rest of hte classes”

now you may not see it that way, but if you look at your post, its what it is.

you wanna know why pistol whip doesnt need a CD? because its S/P ONLY damage oriented move.

this is what people seem not be unable to get thru there heads

many other classes in this game get both not as much utility as a thief, and there moves that do have utility are often doing damage as well.

if there was a Cd on pistol whip, it would mean thieves would have no burst, period, because head host, black powder, and infiltrator strike are not doing much damage if any at all.

this is how the spec is designed, when you need to do damage you use your damage skill, other then that you have to manage it enough to use your utilities when you need it.

but ot make it short, your SUPPOSED to only have one real effect attack per weapon combo as a thief, its intended.

You cannot just circumvent the initiative system, do not start misleading information. There are a few options to gain initiative back and increase the amount, but most of these are spread out through different trees, and if you took all of them to “circumvent” the initiative system you would had a completely ineffective build that would be worthless. Most builds are able to pick up 1 or 2 initiative assistance traits. I think that’s what you meant when you said taints.

It IS fundamentally flawed. No traits or skills should affect initiative gain unless it’s on a completely even play field. It is flawed and won’t be changed unfortunately.

Only comment so far: it’s traits not taints.

Other than that, I feel that you’re quite wrong. You should especially remember that initiative is SHARED between our two weapon sets.

Other professions get 8 cooldowns to juggle, and can use them all one right after another, sometimes endlessly chaining combos. That’s not nearly so easy for Thieves to do.

16 cooldowns, in the case of Elementalist.

Death Blossom, for example, costs 5 initiative. You can use it three times in a row, if you have 15 points in Trickery. And then you can’t use ANY other weapon skill, but for auto attack.

That’s the balancing factor of initiative.

just to be fair, I’m not entirely certain he was complaining about the system being unfair – and I see at least part of his point…

cooldowns are not only a limiting factor, but often force other classes to use all their other skills in order to maximize outgoing effects (dmg, healing, support, etc) – in short, cooldowns are sort of a forced versatility factor – this, combined with other classes relatively large range of diverse weapon setups, allows other classes to experience a far greater range of powers/effects

the idea of initiative is intriguing – by allowing theives to bypass cooldowns, they can spike damage using their skills far faster than any other class – then, when they run out of initiative, we have a variety of utility skills/trait lines that allow us to, presumably, evade out of combat, replenish initiative, and then fly back into combat

now, what I head from at least part of the OP, was that given the theif’s relatively small range of weapons, we already have a very limited range of powers to experience – having a large range of powers isn’t just about utility, it’s also about keeping the experience of playing the class interesting – we are already limited in the range of powers we have

then, you combine that with the initiative system – the initiative system essentially encourages us to spike powers very quickly, then encourages us to slot powers that allow us to escape, replenish, and jump back in the fight – combine this with our relatively limited power selections, and you get the “feeling” that we are essentially being forced, via the initiative mechanic, to spec along the lines of massive spike damage revolving around the cheapest, quickest damaging skill we can find, then picking all those powers/traits that allow us to replenish so we can do it over, and over, and over again

now, this isn’t entirely true…we HAVE other options – but those other options are far more tactical, less reliable, and go strongly against the primary image of a thief in an MMO setting, that of dps frontliner – and for those of us that actually picked the thief just because we happen to like the dps frontliner acrobatic hit-and-fade double-dagger image, the above concern is fairly valid

I have to admit – in retrospect, I’m honestly not sure the initiative system really does what was intended – It was supposed to provide Thieves with an alternate mechanic, one that allowed them to pile on damage in a short time, I would assume, to make up for traditionally expected relatively low survivability – I’m just not sure it really did us any favors

I myself generally find myself building a rotation, and switching to other powers during particular circumstances, only to discover I haven’t got enough initiative, because quite frankly remembering how much initiative each skill costs in the middle of combat, and knowing what 5 points of initiative looks like on my measly little white diamond bar, and having my grey with red spots skills turn to grey with purple spots to indicate that I can’t use them, really sorta screws me, when I find myself trying to hit a skill, only to discover that it’s not doing anything, cuz I don’t have enough initiative, and not enough visual feedback to know that at a moments notice

I actually don’t mind the initiative system all that much – I’m just not sure it does something really great for us – it seems like an unnecessarily different mechanic, and at the very least, I’d like to see a much stronger visual feedback for skills and initiative with the thief.

It personally took me a bit to get my head around initiative, but once it clicked I don’t find I have much issue with it. Yes, the system combined with the low weapon choice does limit what we can and can’t do with it, but it does it in a way that sets the class apart from the other classes.

I also don’t think of skills so much of “this costs x amount of init” and more “if I use this skill now I won’t be able to use this skill right away” or “if I use this combo I can’t use that combo”, and that’s mostly just come with practice.

While I do favor one particular style of playing, I find it a very fast style that if I stop moving for a second I’ll die, but lets me take on hoards of guys by myself (taking advantage of caltops, dodging for caltops and death blossom)

DrakeWurrum

Only comment so far: it’s traits not taints.
Other than that, I feel that you’re quite wrong. You should especially remember that initiative is SHARED between our two weapon sets.
Other professions get 8 cooldowns to juggle, and can use them all one right after another, sometimes endlessly chaining combos. That’s not nearly so easy for Thieves to do.
16 cooldowns, in the case of Elementalist.
Death Blossom, for example, costs 5 initiative. You can use it three times in a row, if you have 15 points in Trickery. And then you can’t use ANY other weapon skill, but for auto attack.
That’s the balancing factor of initiative.

I’m not sure if you’re agreeing or disagreeing here.

While other classes get to juggle a number of different abilities the Thief is most effective when spaming that single effective ability that you’ve decided to base your build on.

It’s just a very uncompelling and simplistic play-style.

To expand on that, say I’m specced into Condition Damage as a Thief. How many viable attacks does that leave me with each weapon combo (assuming I want to get the most out of my specialization). One, maybe two attacks per weapon combo?

I mean D/D has Lotus Strike and LDB that deal Condition Damage…that’s it. Other weapon combos have even less.

Having one good spamming damage with some utilities is how the thief is conceived and it makes sense because of the coupling with initiative. It wouldn’t work any other way. You only NEED one or two attacks per weapon combo (considering you have 5 slots, that’s quite a few IMO). It’s not flawed and it’s not simplistic either. This class makes players manage resources and to some extent, timing. A few classes barely engage you at all. Thief is as simple or as complex as you want it to be, depending on how you play it.

Ruufio.1496:

It IS fundamentally flawed. No traits or skills should affect initiative gain unless it’s on a completely even play field. It is flawed and won’t be changed unfortunately.

wrong, if that were the case, then wed need a complete redesign in the cost of our weapon skills.

i keep seeing people say other classes are more compelling..why? cuz you press a diff ability every time?

they press a diff ability cuz they HAVE to. there is no compelling nature to it. that is also why other classes have there damage spread across more abliities.

look at a thieves abilities, how much damage does black powder do?

the thief class was DESIGNED with this in mind. instead of going thru your rotation or your next ability cuz you ahve to, you have to make a decision, is my next move gonna be damage…or utility?

just cuz of the zergy nature of spvp and wvwvw we see more spamming of our damage moves then utility.

as for the condition damage build comments…thats a flaw in design or its intended for thieves to be mainly power/crit based. however a conditional damage dodge thief really has little room for anything other than doding and hitting LDB…if they stop they die!

The root of the problem with Thief class as I see it is the lack of viable PvE rotation.

In PvP no matter what class you play you’re going to use your abilities situationally as survival and teamplay are high priorities. For PvE, however, you want a rotation. Something that allows you to burst at least 2 mobs at a time without much trouble. (High level zones seem to be tightly packed with mobs so 2 mobs at a time is a minimum. You often just can’t pull one by one.)

As a thief you will generally spam 4/2 (bow), 3 (dual pistol or sword/pistol) or 3/4 (dual daggers). Switching weapon sets is usually a waste of time except for finishing the last remaining mob. Since you’re squishy and you only have soft CC (snares) you have to kite and dodge a lot and well-timed Blind or Daze is your best bet against ranged mobs. Best PvE utilities seem to be passives (signets) and while Thieves Guild is a great elite, it’s on a long c/d.

Ultimately this translates into tedious and unforgiving PvE gameplay. Kiting fast moving mobs? Welcome to bow GTAoE spam where TTK is eternity. A split second late with dodge? That’ll cost you 80% of your HP, sorry. Wanna play melee? Oops, you have no defensive moves. And so further, and so on. It feels like the class is missing something. Guardian and Warrior are tougher and have better CC. Mesmer has virtually unlimited disposable meatshields and various other defenses. Ranger has pets.

You lost me at the 3rd use of Taint instead of Trait. If you are gonna call something fundamentally flawed and expect any results or at least decent feedback, you should use proper terminology and proof read your statements. If its important and worth doing, its worth doing right.

It’s possible his autocorrect had a field day! The post made me chuckle. Go back and edit it, dude.

That said I do believe the initiative system leads to extremely compelling decision dichotomies both in the micro level of combat as you decide what to spend resources on and when, and macro for build crafting to find your preferred methods for how and when you will replenish resources. I feel like I did build crafting in sc2, that’s your macro game.

With my hammer warrior I don’t feel that. I’m just unloading everything I have to put it on cool down. I don’t feel a lot of depth other than timing counters/mitigation skills. With shouts build that layer almost doesn’t even exist.

You people are talking about “DPS rotations” and crap as if using 2-5 on other profession weapons is how you maximize DPS. With a few exceptions, your greatest DPS comes from the #1 skill working unimpeded.

On top of that, not all skills are about “loldamage” sometimes they actually have real uses to them. Take P/P for example.

• The #1 attack is for stacking bleeds, and to just have something when out of init.
• The #2 attack is to stack up Vulnerability really high – not necessarily for YOU, stop being so selfish. It can be, but remember that the max stack is an extra 25% incoming damage to that enemy – do you really think sacrificing ALL initiative to get that is better than getting THREE Unloads out instead of ONE? (hint – that would be 200% increased damage)
• The #3 attack is to just spam a bunch of raw damage. BORING!
• The #4 attack is to Daze. Yay, we can interrupt everything several times in a row!
• The #5 attack is a defensive aoe blind for when enemies get close.

Notice that each ability has a unique and distinct usage. And remember that this game is not purely about damage.

Dee Jay.2460:

DrakeWurrum

Only comment so far: it’s traits not taints.
Other than that, I feel that you’re quite wrong. You should especially remember that initiative is SHARED between our two weapon sets.
Other professions get 8 cooldowns to juggle, and can use them all one right after another, sometimes endlessly chaining combos. That’s not nearly so easy for Thieves to do.
16 cooldowns, in the case of Elementalist.
Death Blossom, for example, costs 5 initiative. You can use it three times in a row, if you have 15 points in Trickery. And then you can’t use ANY other weapon skill, but for auto attack.
That’s the balancing factor of initiative.

I’m not sure if you’re agreeing or disagreeing here.

While other classes get to juggle a number of different abilities the Thief is most effective when spaming that single effective ability that you’ve decided to base your build on.

It’s just a very uncompelling and simplistic play-style.

To expand on that, say I’m specced into Condition Damage as a Thief. How many viable attacks does that leave me with each weapon combo (assuming I want to get the most out of my specialization). One, maybe two attacks per weapon combo?

I mean D/D has Lotus Strike and LDB that deal Condition Damage…that’s it. Other weapon combos have even less.

Should be pretty obvious that my stance on initiative is that it’s perfectly fine and balanced. It’s not at all flawed. The fact is that you have to choose when and HOW to spend your initiative, and then either wait for it to regen or have mechanics to get it back. The ability to use the same ability multiple times in a row is INCREDIBLY powerful in this game, and is only balanced by the fact that all of our weapon skills (save an auto attack) require the same resource, and are all fairly expensive.

(for the record, it’s not LDB anymore, it’s just DB – this has been true since BWE3)

prodigy.1023:

Ultimately this translates into tedious and unforgiving PvE gameplay. Kiting fast moving mobs? Welcome to bow GTAoE spam where TTK is eternity. A split second late with dodge? That’ll cost you 80% of your HP, sorry. Wanna play melee? Oops, you have no defensive moves. And so further, and so on.

I have no defensive moves? Let’s see, my D/D is not even level 30 yet and I have a team stealth utility, a heal ’n stealth, an attack ’n stealth, a throw ’n slow, a bleed ’n slow, a bleed ’n evade, and my standard dodges. Hell, two Death Blossoms, a Caltrops, and a stealth, and I can just stand there and watch centaurs bleed to death. I also have P/P in my secondary with a blind and a slow for kiting if I really want to, or I could switch to S/P and have my black pistol and the blind in auto attack.

L2P is too trite, so I’ll put it this way instead: Know your class. Know your skills. Know how your skills interact with how the enemies act and react. This isn’t last decade’s MMO, you’re going to have to do more to stay alive than just hiking up your stats, setting your rotation, and avoiding red circles.

Thats why I stopped playing a thief, its just spamming one skill. Especially in tPvP at the very moment the enemy team knows your build they will hard counter you so brutal that you dont have any options left. Its because every thief build is a one trick pony build around one function. My mesmer,necro and engi can still do other stuff well if their main role is countered but as a thief you are basicaly useless.

The initiative system is almost impossible to balance. The abilities are only usefull if they are OP because else theirs no reason to spam them and at the same time you cant make them OP because you can spam it.

Mayama.1854:

Its because every thief build is a one trick pony build around one function.

That’s just how people have been building/using the Thief. That doesn’t mean it’s the right way to do it.

Clearly it’s not, because of how “brutal” the counter shut down is.

The meta game will evolve, and people will find smarter ways that don’t involve just spamming a single ability.

I think a lot of people miss the fundamental fact that the thief is built to spam certain abilities. Other professions’ ability cooldowns force them to vary what they’re using, with most abilities pushing multiple mobility/damage/control roles. Thieves, on the other hand, are meant to use whatever ability suits the situation. If they want damage, they use their damage ability, if they want control, they use their control ability. This means that when a thief wants to do one specific thing at a time, they do it really well. When that thing is damage, it often means spamming the one ability on the bar built for damage. It isn’t that the ability is broken, it is that instead of all attack types being broken up throughout a bar that is supposed to be fully utilized, they’re all compartmentalized to be called upon in specific situations.

Tulisin.6945:

I think a lot of people miss the fundamental fact that the thief is built to spam certain abilities. Other professions’ ability cooldowns force them to vary what they’re using, with most abilities pushing multiple mobility/damage/control roles. Thieves, on the other hand, are meant to use whatever ability suits the situation. If they want damage, they use their damage ability, if they want control, they use their control ability. This means that when a thief wants to do one specific thing at a time, they do it really well. When that thing is damage, it often means spamming the one ability on the bar built for damage. It isn’t that the ability is broken, it is that instead of all attack types being broken up throughout a bar that is supposed to be fully utilized, they’re all compartmentalized to be called upon in specific situations.

It’s also designed so that, if you spend ALL of your initiative on doing huge damage to an enemy, and then the kitten hits the fan, you’re boned.

Consequences for poor decision-making!

LOL Condition damage Thief? That doesn’t even make sense to go dual daggers. Bleeds don’t scale for anything and that’s because they stack intensely. If they scaled well then Bleeds would be OP again. If anything you should run Shortbow for Poison. That one scales a lot better, just like Burning. Enjoy your no damage Thief by running D/D for Death Blossom while stacking Condition Damage. This isn’t beta, lol.

Also you have several effective attacks per weapon combo, but you’re just being ignorant at how to use them and when to use them. You’re only thinking of “OMG DAMAGE DAMAGE DAMAGE; I NEED MORE DAMAGE” literally. That is what you said when you decided putting that down in your post.

Everything has a use, guy. Except maybe Sword/Empty skill Stab. That’s probably the worst skill this class has to offer. Everything else is all a matter on what the situation is.

Personally I’d be more inclined to say the other professions are fundamentally flawed because most of their attacks are just letting the #1 skill auto fire and occasionally using the other skills when cooldowns expire. I remember Colin Johanson on the Manifesto video saying that combat would be different in GW2 because you’re not just swinging a sword over and over, but that’s exactly how I feel playing other professions. With the Thief and the Initiative mechanic I feel a lot more control because as long as I have Initiative, I can pick and choose which skills I want to use rather than being at the mercy of cooldowns.

Baseline Bleed at L80 is 43 damage per tick. 5s Bleed does 215 damage.

Now add 1000 Condition Damage!
You now do 93 damage per tick. 5s Bleed does 465 damage.

Add 1000 Precision, get 50% crit.

Granted, Death Blossom does a ~11 second Bleed – 3 of them, meaning ~3500 damage Bleed per Death Blossom per target, not including white damage, if you have 1000 Condition Damage. 3 in a row is massive damage. It’s definitely viable. I’ll stick with my ~1350 per Death Blossom though with zero Condition Damage, and land some Crits, procing my weapon Sigils.

DrakeWurrum.6049:

With a few exceptions, your greatest DPS comes from the #1 skill working unimpeded.

This isn’t true for many reasons but even if it were… you see, dead people do no DPS. With a few exceptions you can’t just spam your #1 in GW2. Especially while soloing, so in your rotation you need offensive and defensive moves. Thief has more than enough of the former but seriously lacks the latter.

Uruz Six.6594:

Let’s see, my D/D is not even level 30 yet

Come back when you hit at least 70. Pre-70 zones are walk in the park.

Yeah, no, you’re blatantly wrong.

D/D: Death Blossom has a built-in Evade. Can throw a dagger to cripple multiple targets. Can stealth to avoid damage for a few seconds.
P/P: Ranged Daze. AoE Blind + smoke field, which blinds and can be used to stealth if needed.
S/D: Flanking Strike has a built-in evade, plus the dagger throwing and stealthing. Stealth attack will blind, daze if you’re behind.
S/P: Stun. Plus the ranged Daze. Plus the smoke field.

Do I really need to go on? Because the Thief is not lacking for defense, it’s just not “I CAN TAKE A DOZEN HITS BECAUSE OF ARMORS!” You’re a mobile leather-wearing Thief. You’re meant to be tricksy, evasive. Play to your strengths.

And if you spent all of your initiative on a damaging hit, that’s your mistake. Don’t blame the profession on poor decision-making.

DrakeWurrum.6049:

Yeah, no, you’re blatantly wrong.

You’re a mobile leather-wearing Thief. You’re meant to be tricksy, evasive. Play to your strengths.

/sigh

Just try to level some other class someday. And you’ll see for yourself how weak Thief is. All your “tricky, evasive” is just another wording for “lacking the ability to stomp trash mobs like every other class does”. For the most impressive display of power you can try Guardian. But don’t complain that after playing Guardian it’s hard to convince yourself to log on your Thief again.

My experience with DD is as varied as a weapon set can be in this game I think.
1 Basic attack when I’m recharging; I also get +10% damage if I’m over 6 initiative
2 I never spammed this; even before the ‘nerf’ (although I am noticing this attack ‘missing’ a lot recently for some reason). I use this one or twice when my target is low on health, or as a way to get back on my target faster than running
3 This is so powerful that it is tempting to spam and it avoids attacks. So good in PvE. Harder to catch peeps with this in PvP.
4 Nice ranged ‘aoe’ damage with a long cripple. When combined with roll with initiative you can crank five of these out in short order while keeping your distance. It’s just mop up after that.
5 Stealth, vulnerability and back stab. Need any one say more?

I confess though that I’m not condition spec’d so #3 isn’t as tempting to spam.

Steal
5
1 back stab
3
4 if getting adds perhaps; or swarmed by some one else’s aggro running by
2 finisher

As to prodigy’s comment. Ya know … there are some situations that I had to fight tooth and nail for; barely escaping with my life. Then some large armored dude with a giant sword come’s in and rick rolls every thing in a matter of seconds with out moving (if you don’t count spinning to win). I do feel a little put out some times, but then I remember I like living by the skin of my teeth.

prodigy.1023:

/sigh

Just try to level some other class someday. And you’ll see for yourself how weak Thief is. All your “tricky, evasive” is just another wording for “lacking the ability to stomp trash mobs like every other class does”. For the most impressive display of power you can try Guardian. But don’t complain that after playing Guardian it’s hard to convince yourself to log on your Thief again.

i get the strong impression from this post that you are basically just bad at playing Thief. have you seriously not figured out how to wreck trash mobs on a thief? its incredibly easy. what are you even doing wrong? there are like 3 different builds that are all good at doing it. Have you even seen what a bleed stacking Dagger+Dagger Thief can do with Death Blossoms? I can kill mobs 2 levels above me, in groups of 5 at a time!

basically you should just learn to play.

prodigy.1023:

DrakeWurrum.6049:

Yeah, no, you’re blatantly wrong.

You’re a mobile leather-wearing Thief. You’re meant to be tricksy, evasive. Play to your strengths.

/sigh

Just try to level some other class someday. And you’ll see for yourself how weak Thief is. All your “tricky, evasive” is just another wording for “lacking the ability to stomp trash mobs like every other class does”. For the most impressive display of power you can try Guardian. But don’t complain that after playing Guardian it’s hard to convince yourself to log on your Thief again.

Funny enough, my first character after launch was a guardian, which i got bored of and then created a thief, that i had a LOT more fun on

Why would I “learn to play” a weak and counter-intuitive class when other classes I tried are stronger and more well-rounded? Sense, this idea makes none.

And I don’t find Guardian (or Mesmer for that matter) boring. On the contrary, I find Thief tiresome and tedious beyond all reasonable limits.

“Just try to level some other class someday. And you’ll see for yourself how weak Thief is. "

I do. I must just be used to the speed and mobility and utility, because I find Warrior slow and tedious, Elementalist fun and mobile but too many keystrokes for not enough payoff, and pretty much fell asleep with an Engineer or Guardian.

They’re effective in their own way, but the Mesmer and Ranger are the only two classes that engage me as much as a Thief, and even then only the Mesmer is as fun to play.

I’ve actually got 6 characters, and have made plenty of short-term temporary characters by now, and my Guardian and Thief are about even in level and gear. I enjoy my Norn Guardian simply because I love the “big beefy guy that can support his buddies” playstyle I’ve come to cultivate from years of playing a Tauren Shaman.

But my Thief is my main, because the evasive stealthy playstyle is just as fun, arguably more fun. I have played every profession, and find them all fun, but Thief is my main purely for the aesthetics and playstyle.

If I felt “weak” I’d go back to my Guardian. And I don’t.

How did a reasonably constructive discussion about Thief mechanics turn into a flamefest about easy mode Guardians and if Thieves were somehow weak?

That entire discussion seems to be besides the point.

The original point was how Initiative encourages players to efficiently focus on spaming a single core ability, whichever is most effective in their build. This applies to Heartseeker, Pistol Whip, Death Blossom etc.

Instead of encouraging variety, Initiative encourages the opposite. (Yes, not all builds work like that, but enough.)

ANet may nerf this or that, but fundamentally nothing will change because using your best attack will be the best use of initiative. And that’s flawed.

the initiative system is basically about imposing a tension between blowing all the initiative on attacks or saving some for more situational abilities.

for example, in Dagger+Dagger I can, if i choose, spam Death Blossom and nothing else. This works ok when my opponents are literally robots (in PvE) or players who are so bad they don’t pose any threat to me and I just want to kill them faster. But this leaves me without initiative to spend on abilities that are very important in harder fights. Against more competent opponents I very badly want to have initiative available to use Dancing Dagger and Cloak and Dagger so I can control the fight a bit better.

This natural tension is actually a GOOD thing. it means that learning not to spam damage attacks is a major hurdle in the learning curve. Climbing the learning curve is meaningful. This is something that matters. Well designed systems actually do present a learning cure to be climbed so there is something to distinguish experts from novices. The system is a good one and should stay in place.

I think it went that direction simply from your assumption that the design of thieves is inherently flawed. It’s not initiative that encourages a lack of variety, it’s a lack of equivalent damage attacks across the various weapon combinations and frankly, I don’t see that happening here.

Thieves are about resource management. The fact you oppose the implications of this on the calss means that you shouldn’t play thieves.