Guild Wars 2

In PvE, my thief wields 2 daggers, is specced for tremendous crit chance, and has so far proven to be a neigh unstoppable damage machine. Fun! Then I decided to take her on a dungeon run, and ouch, what an embarrassment. The poor people who ran with me kept kindly reviving me, but it can’t have been enjoyable for them (nor was it for me).

So, I did some reading on how-what-not-to-fight-like as a thief in dungeons, and saw some interesting suggestions (here’s an example from these forums: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Looking-for-Thief-Dungeon-Build).

I think I’m getting the basic idea, but I must admit that it’s still not entirely clear to me how all of this is to be assembled into a functional dungeon-running thief. How does a thief approach the fight? What basic strategies/rotations are recommended for boss fights? Clearly, blinding mobs is important, as is shadow stepping, but what skill is deployed at what time? Just some fundamental info would be nice, and any advice is greatly appreciated!

Thanks to any of you who take the time to respond.

Approach depends on the group and situation. For trash you can pretty much sustain yourself with pistol whip or detonate cluster bomb with signet of malice. When stacking for trash, blinding fields keep you and your allies from needing to heal as much, and they can instead focus on damaging. Pistol whip has the same DPS as sword auto attack so you don’t lose any DPS from using initiative to place blinding fields instead.

That just leaves tougher mob encounters and bosses, which are just a case of doing it, and learning from what works and what doesn’t. D/D back stab is a popular way to go, and P/P is a good choice for weapon swap in a single target situation for when you get low health; you can drop back swap to pistols and unload to get significant heals out of your signet. If you’re dangerously low and want a burst heal, placing shadow refuge then stealth attack + unload will also get you some leech health combos on top of the pulse heals from shadow refuge itself. You might not want to burn shadow refuge for such a thing but if you need the health, it’s a perfectly good use of the utility. You’d use it to revive someone anyway, the only difference is you’re preventing others from needing to revive you.

An important note when running glass is that if your group is not also glass, things simply won’t die fast enough, and you will die not from being a bad player, but because you have the wrong build for your party’s set up (or as some perceive it, the wrong party). If in doubt, or want some safety while learning the fights, stick 30 in Shadow Arts for Shadow’s Rejuvenation and you’ll get 323 health back for each back stab, and 2 stacks of might (you can maintain 8 stacks of might for yourself doing this which more than makes up for the loss of power (but not the damage modifiers).

Thanks, Impact! That’s pretty much exactly what I needed. Appreciated!

I find that dungeons get tremendously easier when I’ve run them a couple times, to really learn what weapons and utilities are best where, and the mechanics of each part of the path. I was in your same boat a couple weeks ago, dungeons were just dreadful. I’ve blocked out the first time I ever ran CoE on my thief, (which happened to be my first time running the dungeon) and it was so kitten frustrating. But… needless to say, CoE is one of my favorite dungeons to run for daily gold and tokens and xp now, because once I learned proper dodging time (thiefs have it easy with s/p #3) it really became a new dungeon and I could appreciate it a lot more (alive). Its really just practice and experience.

But, as for general tips, when you’re stacking, spam s/p #3 as it is a constant evade, and with the new buff to 1s initiative regen, along with the trait that gives initiative on crit, I am able to keep up high amounts of dodges. I also swap out my heals according to to which path of which dungeon I am doing, for example, when I stack, I either bring HiS or SoM (when I am not stacking, I sometimes bring withdraw for the evade and short CD). SoM is a really poweful heal in higher leveled dungeons where the ticks combined with pistol whips multiple attacks are really beneficial. A nice combo I’ve found for a quick burst heal, if needed, is black powder coped with daggerstorm and SoM if there are multiple mobs around. A thief is a bit different from other classes in that it doesn’t really have a set rotation defined by ICD’s, but the general positioning and rotation is always start the boss from the back and use CnD – > BS → AA chain → CnD. Anything with defiant and unshakeable, I personally wouldn’t waste my initiatve for black powder on, because blinds are only 20% effective, I believe, so I stick with either pistol whipping it to death (in some cases where a mesmer has pushed it to the wall) or just d/d backstab.

Lastly, utilize stealth when running past mobs with shadow refuge and blinding powder and HiS, along with shortbow #5 to really gain ground while in stealth. The only dungeon where 13s+ stealth isn’t enough is maybe some parts in TA if you don’t stop at the safe spots.

Short Bow – You’re welcome

Thanks so much, guys! This is all good stuff.

3 things.

First you learn dungeons with time so dodging and evading attacks get easier the longer you play. If you are dying all the time on thief wear sturdier gear. You can get back to zerker but when you are learning dungeons its best to lose a little DPS rather than force other players to rez you.

S/P in melee is pretty much as easy as it gets in dungeons fights. Anyplace where you need to stack (like AC) this would be your go to. Cleave helps quite a bit as well when dealing with trash.

Bring every weapon with you. Some times you just have to range DPS (like TA) having PP and SB even when not traited for that type of build this will save you and your party a lot of hassle.

TheGuy.3568:

when you are learning dungeons its best to lose a little DPS rather than force other players to rez you.

An excellent point(er). Thanks!

Good topic I’ll come to that problem later on as well

sword pistol
25/30/0/015

signet of malice
caltrops
-
-
food that regens hp on hit, preferably the candied dragon roll which is cheap

caltrops and pistol whip regens so much hp it makes healing signet look bad.
face tank everything better than your warrior buddy
break out d/d if you feel like bursting a solo target down quicker, but theres no need to because youre hitting for over 3-5k AA and 15k pistol whips which will suffice

Amazing. Just played around with some of this stuff and I keep looking at my health meter, which barely drops, and suddenly my opponent—dead. Only practicing on non-Dungeon mobs for now, of course, but still. I think I’m beginning to see the light. Thanks all!

PvE dungeons/fractals, you really only 3 sets.

Sword/Pistol – Pistol 5 + Auto attack for persistent blind and weakening on trash mobs. I don’t recommend pistol whip since it’s primarily selfish play.
Short Bow – Cluster bomb spam on fire fields for stacking might, beating trash mobs that require you to be mobile, etc. Occasionally throw down poison fields and if traited with Lotus Poison (15 points in Deadly Arts), give all enemies Weakening affected by poison.
Dagger/Dagger – primarily boss fights. Cloak and dagger → backstab → autoattack combo, rinse and repeat.

Utility skills: Shadow Refuge, Smoke Screen, Signet of Agility, Roll for Intiative/Infiltrator’s signet/Shadowstep is usually my rotation.

Thank you, Tachii. It’s all beginning to come together! :-)

Thanks you from me as well Especially about the idea with the food

1. Gear -Full zerker as thief is non-sense in dungeons. Even for something as simple as cof or ac, you will get hit, and hit hard by boss attacks. A dead thief = 0 dps, keep that in mind when gearing up. Valkyrie mixed with zerker is a good step, as it gives you that much needed hp. Hp is better for thief than toughness because it works against conditions and direct damage, conditions ignore toughness/armor. Also we are the lowest health bracket so sitting at 9-10k hp is not healthy. Also a calvaliar amulet doesn’t hurt, gives a good boost of toughness and keeps your crit dmg high. You generally don’t need to exceed 50% crit chance, its mostly wasted at that point especially if you have access to fury (thrill of the crime, furious retaliation, runes, etc).

2. Traits- Traits are easier to adjust than gear, as they are much cheaper. If you’re going into CoE, get venom share with BV for the subject alpha guy. If you’re going into AC make sure to pack high evasion traits/skills. If you’re going into CoF, pack some regen or some kind. If you’re going into high level fractals (30-50) pack more defence than offence as your gear should cover the offence fairly well. Don’t try horsing around with some bunker thief build, but don’t go full glass for things like that either ,it will hurt a lot and likely grant you a bad rep with the few people who seem to know a thing or 2 bout higher level fractals (I salute those who do, and block those who don’t).

3. Playstyle- d/d isn’t universal. You will have to switch out weapons depending on what your doing. If you’re luring trash mobs by LoS, use s/p with SoM and infiltrator’s signet and smoke screen. The constant blind fields and heavy cleaving will put a serious dent in those headless chickens. If you’re ranged, use p/p as it is the best ranged dps for thief. Sadly it still hits like a wet noodle compared to warrior rifle or ranger lb but its better than thief sb which is more of a utility weapon. You can mess with d/d but if the boss has heavy hits that are hard to avoid, pack a feline grace and vigorous recovery traits to help keep you dodges up. Dagger aa isn’t enough to keep your endurance up. Some dungeons have really slow hitting bosses and you can just shrug their dmg off, others not so much.

4. Thief utility- smoke screen in either utility or as a trait for ranged bosses, as walls are usually awesome. SR for stealth rez but if you carry off-hand pistol you can pack blind powder and get 7 seconds stealth right there, much shorter cd with enough time to rez and in the event someone is low on hp and running (likely to not pay attention to SR circle), BPS+ BP is instant rather than a restricted zone. BV ignores defiant so it’s a great choice for interrupting a boss channel skill or just keeping it still for a teammate to get some distance/raised. Otherwise the rest is just learning boss mechanics and dodging appropriately.

2.

Whilst you only need 2 sets for dungeons you are shortchanging yourself if you don’t learn when to use the others. Pistol/dagger is poor generally but for some fights it is just perfect.

Very cool, this thread’s a real “Dungeon Thief 101.” Thanks once more to all of you for the generous advice; it’s definitely given me an understanding of the class, and changed my game for the better. Just proves once again that GW2 has one of the best communities around.

Just gonna drop this here, but this is probably one of the best, most comprehensive dungeon thief guides around. It covers a wide range of builds as well as how to use them in dungeons:

http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/87167-a-guide-to-the-thief-meta/

Awesome, thanks!

I’m running 0/30/20/20/0, full zerk armor and trinkets. It’s been alright so far in dungeons and fractals. I often swap weapons depending on the scenario but would normally pack s/p and s/b. Dodging is very important. I guess the trick is to play like a thief and I mean hitting enemies from the side or from behind.

good tips, will come back here.