Guild Wars 2

Malkavian.3751:

> Designs class around high damage, low survivability
> Nerfs skills and damage repeatability
> Class becomes useless. Can role a warrior and do just as much (or more) damage with much higher survivability. Why play a class with mediocre damage AND low survivability?

Thieves do not have low survivability. If you do, you’re doing it wrong.

I see the future in the WvW
Tief Zerg all invisible forever, killing and finishing invisible…
This profession is out of any balance…

that is ridiculous..

no class is “designed” for one thing, the concept behind gw2 is that every way should be viable in terms of damage/survivability, no matter the class, race or gear.

If you want to build “that” way you can do so.

So, admitting thieves are made to be a burst dmg class is like saying there’s smtg wrong with them which means they need a change, thus your statements backfires.

My point is, right now they are a burst dmg class, yes, and no1 can compare to thieves in terms of damage, I don’t rly know how I’d balance things there are many options like:

Initiative recharges slower in pvp.
Make some thief skills scale a bit less once past a certain amount of power (in pvp)
Cap crits to a certain amount, this would work for bosses too (every class)

If one of these actions pass effectively then we could consider:
adding more useful shadow step utilities.
adding some kind of more useful crowd control moves.
reworking traps AoE either make up for what they are now.
better “steal”-style skills, as of now thieves don’t really “steal”.

crewthief.8649:

lonewolf.2601:

tagnut.8621:

Most of the thief players i know admit they are very overpowered – and its one of the reasons so many have switched to them.

A nerf – a big one – would be most welcome by 90% of the community.

Sorry but your friends do not how to play this game.
A big nerf would only make things worse for the whole game, but I don’t think anet has the intention to ruin their game, they seem to have learned from other companies mistakes.

Of course not. The only people who know how to play the game are Thief players, right? I know plenty of very good players, and most of them believe Thieves are due a nerf. Sorry to break it to you.

The only people in this conversation that know how to play the game are Thief players. Non-thief players are good at the game too, but they just play the game instead of trying to get nerfs to a class that is obviously not overpowered.

Ichishi.9613:

you demand nerf for a thiefs that can’t do anything to you? or nerf for yourself?

Yes, this seems quite prevalent here… “I can easily kill almost all thieves I run across but NERF THIEVES OMFG!!!!111?”

Sorry, I will just repost here for a hope of getting more attention

Guys what do you think about this kind of a fix: moving hidden killer trait (100% crit chance in stealth) into a shadow arts last tier?
This will solve many problems:
1) backstabs will either not crit with 100% chance or people will have to sacrifice power/crit damage for it, and non-glass build will not suffer because they don’t go there anyway
2) shadow arts trait line will get buffed and will result in even more thieves speccing out of glass cannon backstabs
Perhaps if there are enough people willing to bet on this, we could draw a-net’s attention to this kind of soft/preliminary fix if they have not thought of it already

Ichishi.9613:

Sorry, I will just repost here for a hope of getting more attention

Guys what do you think about this kind of a fix: moving hidden killer trait (100% crit chance in stealth) into a shadow arts last tier?
This will solve many problems:
1) backstabs will either not crit with 100% chance or people will have to sacrifice power/crit damage for it, and non-glass build will not suffer because they don’t go there anyway
2) shadow arts trait line will get buffed and will result in even more thieves speccing out of glass cannon backstabs
Perhaps if there are enough people willing to bet on this, we could draw a-net’s attention to this kind of soft/preliminary fix if they have not thought of it already

Potentially okay. What would you replace it with?

bwillb.2165:

crewthief.8649:

bwillb.2165:

Some ppl just here for ego trips. There are not even a handful of people in this thread that actuly want to get the thief balanced. They just dont want to miss their instagibs.

Thieves ARE balanced. You just want to be able to stomp over thieves as easily as you do every other class, o mighty warrior. I mean, your latest argument is basically: “Thieves are easy to kill but sometimes extremely skilled thieves can run away before I get a chance to obliterate them.”

Apparently they are NOT balanced…they’re being adjusted very soon, according to Anet, LOL. But all the pros in this thread will be fine, right? I mean, they’ll obviously adapt instead of relying on an OP crutch, right?

They’re being adjusted because the current arenanet is bad at balance. I mean, they think warriors are fine but thieves deserve hundreds of nerfs. come on. But yep, they’ll adapt. Until the bads that are whining for thief nerfs continue to whine for thief nerfs, anet gives in yet again, and eventually everything the thief has is 100% useless. Doesn’t matter how good you are, you can’t rip out someone’s heart with a sword made of cotton balls.

Tell me when thief is balanced when you can speck a 2 hit build on any other class to kill any one in 2 hits. Till then plz dont say they are balanced because they are definitely not.

Phantom.8130:

also, you’re backpedaling when confronted by facts, and changing your argument on the spot. if you’re going to take a stance, you should probably make sure you have the correct information, and make a rock solid argument. instead of moving the goal posts every time you’re proven to be incorrect.

Yea, I’ve seen it several times with Mosh, every time he’s proven wrong, he goes back and deletes his post. I get really confused sometimes when people quote him and i can’t find the original. He doesn’t even bother admitting he’s wrong, just delete the evidence, its much easier on the ego.

Mosharn.8357:

bwillb.2165:

crewthief.8649:

bwillb.2165:

Some ppl just here for ego trips. There are not even a handful of people in this thread that actuly want to get the thief balanced. They just dont want to miss their instagibs.

Thieves ARE balanced. You just want to be able to stomp over thieves as easily as you do every other class, o mighty warrior. I mean, your latest argument is basically: “Thieves are easy to kill but sometimes extremely skilled thieves can run away before I get a chance to obliterate them.”

Apparently they are NOT balanced…they’re being adjusted very soon, according to Anet, LOL. But all the pros in this thread will be fine, right? I mean, they’ll obviously adapt instead of relying on an OP crutch, right?

They’re being adjusted because the current arenanet is bad at balance. I mean, they think warriors are fine but thieves deserve hundreds of nerfs. come on. But yep, they’ll adapt. Until the bads that are whining for thief nerfs continue to whine for thief nerfs, anet gives in yet again, and eventually everything the thief has is 100% useless. Doesn’t matter how good you are, you can’t rip out someone’s heart with a sword made of cotton balls.

Tell me when thief is balanced when you can speck a 2 hit build on any other class to kill any one in 2 hits. Till then plz dont say they are balanced because they are definitely not.

Aren’t you the warrior who just 1 page ago was saying you can kill thieves in a single whirlwind attack? And that’s an AoE attack… And it doesn’t have the setup and positioning requirements of a good backstab…

I think thieves need to stop comparing themselves with warriors though.. generally hundred blades will do barely 10K damage, even though it takes almost four seconds to complete, roots the warrior and gives you ages to react. A large amount of skills can be used to stop hundred blades, such as any stun breaker, a simple dodge, a daze, a knockback, a knockdown, a stun, etc..

Where as backstab, it just goes bam from stealth and it’s finished.. doing the same damage instantly, with no warning to allow for dodging or any kind of reaction. That’s hardly comparable in any way. Hundred blades is not a pvp skill, only afk people will eat a full hundred blades, it is only used for pve, dungeons, leveling and for destroying structures in wvw.

That said, I don’t think thief needs a damage downgrade, they should kill squishies very fast, but having toughness should completely prevent getting instagibbed.. so I think that improving toughness will solve all spike damage problems from all professions, without having to nerf pvp professions such as thief and mesmer. Improving toughness will in general make fights less frustrating as they are longer then, and give people more time to react.

bwillb.2165:

Aren’t you the warrior who just 1 page ago was saying you can kill thieves in a single whirlwind attack? And that’s an AoE attack…

Stop picking apart his argument, you’ll hurt his ego. Also you’ll probably won’t be able to find evidence of that post because Moshy is a repeat offender or deleting his own incriminating posts.

@Moshy:
We are willing to discuss balancing thieves, but all you other classes do is gloss over our suggestions and continue on your merry little nerfstomp. I’ve made my suggestions many times and not once has anyone made a comment about it.

crewthief.8649:

Malkavian.3751:

> Designs class around high damage, low survivability
> Nerfs skills and damage repeatability
> Class becomes useless. Can role a warrior and do just as much (or more) damage with much higher survivability. Why play a class with mediocre damage AND low survivability?

Thieves do not have low survivability. If you do, you’re doing it wrong.

Thieves do have low survivability. If you can’t kill a thief, you’re doing it wrong.

Zsymon.8457:

I think thieves need to stop comparing themselves with warriors though.. generally hundred blades will do barely 10K damage, even though it takes almost four seconds to complete, roots the warrior and gives you ages to react. A large amount of skills can be used to stop hundred blades, such as any stun breaker, a simple dodge, a daze, a knockback, a knockdown, a stun, etc..

Where as backstab, it just goes bam from stealth and it’s finished.. doing the same damage instantly, with no warning to allow for dodging or any kind of reaction. That’s hardly comparable in any way. Hundred blades is not a pvp skill, only afk people will eat a full hundred blades, it is only used for pve, dungeons, leveling and for destroying structures in wvw.

That said, I don’t think thief needs a damage downgrade, they should kill squishies very fast, but having toughness should completely prevent getting instagibbed.. so I think that improving toughness will solve all spike damage problems from all professions, without having to nerf pvp professions such as thief and mesmer.

Getting hit with bulls charge/other cc from a warrior without a breaker = instant death from 100b+frenzy. As a glass cannon you’re generally downed before the skill even does all the ticks of damage.

Thieves have high survivability if you think of it as successfully running away from a fight, low survivability if you mean sticking around in a fight.

I think thieves need to stop comparing themselves with warriors though.. generally hundred blades will do barely 10K damage, even though it takes almost four seconds to complete, roots the warrior and gives you ages to react. A large amount of skills can be used to stop hundred blades, such as any stun breaker, a simple dodge, a daze, a knockback, a knockdown, a stun, etc..

But that’s an exact mirror to the argument we gave against the Pistol Whip nerf. Besides, ArenaNet has said warriors are balanced. So if warriors are balanced, it is warriors we are going to compare to when speaking of attaining balance on other classes. So other classes need to be buffed to the level of warriors, not nerfed to the level of necromancers.

I’ve run a D/D backstab burst build on my thief before for the luls… but that is all it is good for. When it comes down to actually achieving PvP goals it is subpar by a long shot and numerous other thief builds are going to outplay it.

I wouldn’t personally lose any sleep over a backstab nerf, but I do think it is sort of pointless. A thief who builds for high burst backstab has almost zero utility, has the lowest hp imaginable, and nearly the lowest armor too. The only “survivability” it can claim is stealth, which is really only effective against people who aren’t really that effective themselves to begin with.

Burst builds in general are really good at one thing, killing off people with slow reaction time, poor situational awareness, and glass cannon set ups. If those three things describe you, you are going to have a hellova time with burst builds. Thieves do burst better than the other professions, so this fact is exaggerated even further vs a burst thief. But it is one of their niches, each profession has them. This is one of the thief’s.

Speaking purely anecdotally, I have zero concern when facing a burst thief. I know exactly what they are trying to do, I know what they need to do it, and I just don’t let them find their personal cosmic alignment that means they 1 shot me. Deny them anything on the long list of requirements to pull off a huge burst combo, and you will find they are very soft targets that melt without much effort at all.

And again… what exactly is this thief build good at? Is it holding control points? No. Taking control points? Not really… Running around the map picking off people who aren’t even contributing or paying attention? Yes!

Sounds like the best spec evar! Where do I sign up? Lol.

Frozen i havent deleted any posts. And i did comment on your suggestion and also gave a suggestion. either they being deleted by mods or your tripping.

Yertle do you have any anti stun utility? i usualy have shadow step as my utility and it works pretty good for trolling as you can move between 2 places pretty quick and also cure stun or knockdown(not really cure but your pretty far from the person who stunned or knocked you down rendering thier combo uselss). It breaks the BR/HB combo and also gives you nice distance to prepare to counter. But very little time to react if they frenzy it.

Some ppl just here for ego trips. There are not even a handful of people in this thread that actuly want to get the thief balanced. They just dont want to miss their instagibs.

I don’t want miss anything, since I’m not a thief. I’m only objective and I can say that in every MMO everyone complains about rogue classes, because everyone gets nerd-enraged if they are backstabbed in few seconds.

tagnut.8621:

Most of the thief players i know admit they are very overpowered – and its one of the reasons so many have switched to them.

A nerf – a big one – would be most welcome by 90% of the community.

’Cause 90% of community is frustrated and blind and can only point at thieves whereas there are a lot of other things to fix to make the sPvP more balanced.

bwillb.2165:

crewthief.8649:

Malkavian.3751:

> Designs class around high damage, low survivability
> Nerfs skills and damage repeatability
> Class becomes useless. Can role a warrior and do just as much (or more) damage with much higher survivability. Why play a class with mediocre damage AND low survivability?

Thieves do not have low survivability. If you do, you’re doing it wrong.

Thieves do have low survivability. If you can’t kill a thief, you’re doing it wrong.

+1

And, just to remind, C&D + steal + BS combo has 45 seconds CD (34-s if traited at MAX, but in this case it isn’t the BS build). I know that they can BS any time they are in stealth, but it isn’t so immediate as C&D-etc combo since you can continuously move to avoid it.

Mosharn.8357:

@bwillb

my post was meant for more experienced thief players. As they are the only ones who know how to get out of a bad situation fast. The nubs are dead in one whirl but an experienced thief uses stealth skill and spams with 5 skill on SB to get away which dosent mean you can catch them on any given class.

I do not use frenzy on my war. but in wvw takin a 18k hit is a death sentence because that 18k isnt the only amount of dmg you take. I have 22.2k hp so i know this.

And endure has a CD near basilisks CD. Sure it counters it but you wont have it up all the time to count every single basilisk you get hit with which are many as finding a thief alone is hard since they usually run in groups of 2+. Even if you do counter it with endure the thief will reset combo by using 5 skill on SB and comin right back at you with the combo without the venom and you have lost one or possibly 2 utilities by now and your rush/WW on CD while the thief has no CD since the skills are dependent on initiative.
Also no good war uses endure in traits its stupid long on CD and useless since you only buy your self 4 seconds in which your already dead.

@Alistar again after reading your cancerous reply to the other 3 ppl. Forums are to discuss anyone can discuss what ever they want. If you want to delete that then you are basically asking for the whole class topic to be deleted. Nerf/buff calls are common so stop takin em to heart.

Stop with the 18K BS. That before the assassins signet change and that’s now impossible. I have tested with the new patch and the highest I’ve ever got is around 10K tested in WvW on a low level naked ranger with no vitality/toughness(in a controlled enviroment). As others said, all you’re doing is showing you aren’t exactly in touch with how BS works now.

@doomdesire
So u even can’t use so easy build Becouse i got hitted for 9k in to 2000 toughntness

No offense but in WvW thieves need a nerf, a heavy one at that and soon. Due to the whole render distance thing being able to stay in stealth far longer than intended you should be able to and being able to drop backstabs fast enough to do 20k+ damage in a few seconds is very OP and frankly… you thieves know it. In my WvW gear I usually have around 1500 toughness and somewhere around 25k health (not a ton I know but I’m just saying I’m not running a glass cannon build either) and I regularly get taken down by thieves in (not joking or exaggerating) 3-4 sec if I don’t have endure pain up, if I do you just disappear run away and I have no recourse, that… isn’t really balanced at all. So yea, every other class knows running a glass cannon build isn’t really viable for PvP or WvW and it’s time for the kings of that to know it too.

You guys need a serious look over several of your skills as horribly exploitable at the moment, and you’re lying to yourself if you think that folks aren’t using these to have some rather unreasonable abilities compared to all the other classes.

problem was never in raw damage. problem is in a-net for the first time doing separate crit chance stat WITH crit power on top of it. They just could not account for every situation yet with this rather flawed mechanic. Flawed to the point that damage does not exist when there are not crits.

Lol, you have ALL a lot of toughness and vitality – "Ah, I have Xk tough, and XXk health, I’m ultra strong and ultra tough, I’ve been hit for 20k damge (are you serious? XD), thieves need a nerf, bla bla bla "

I seriously want a screen of your phantasmagorical stats, cause actually I HAVE such a high tough and vitality, and RARELY I die for thieves. And IF they hit me, they do 8k, MAX 12k with BS. So c’mon, less chit-chats, more facts.

The problem you’re describing Atti, is the rendering issue. I’ve never heard a thief player claim anything other than that it should be fixed asap. We all know it needs to be fixed, everyone admits it… nothing to see, move along. But they’re not actually in stealth longer than intended, for clarity sake you should know the difference. Not rendering in quickly, and being stealthed, are not identical. You may not be able to fully see them, but their location is actually noticeable while unrendered, and they can be targeted while not rendered in too.

Exaggeration leads to people discrediting you as an unreliable source of information, and can render your opinions meaningless and pointless, as people will tune you out. There are plenty enough real issues, you don’t have to pretend they are something they aren’t for people to listen, quite the contrary.

“dropping backstabs fast enough to do 20k+ damage in a few seconds” though, is patently false. You can only do 1 backstab in a few seconds, it isn’t even mechanically possible to more than one in a few seconds, ever. No amount of personal skill, gear, traits or combination thereof can alter that either. Simply, not, possible.

So again to that whole exaggerating thing. Best practice if you want to be heard? Don’t embellish, it just casts doubt on everything you have to say.

Naustis.8510:

@doomdesire
So u even can’t use so easy build Becouse i got hitted for 9k in to 2000 toughntness

Make clear if you’re talking about just Backstab itself or the whole Backstab combo.
The whole combo can deal up to 16k-18k damage on a ~2600 armor target, and during that combo Backstab can hit for 8k-9k damage.

Ravnodaus.5130:

The problem you’re describing Atti, is the rendering issue. I’ve never heard a thief player claim anything other than that it should be fixed asap. We all know it needs to be fixed, everyone admits it… nothing to see, move along. But they’re not actually in stealth longer than intended, for clarity sake you should know the difference. Not rendering in quickly, and being stealthed, are not identical. You may not be able to fully see them, but their location is actually noticeable while unrendered, and they can be targeted while not rendered in too.

Exaggeration leads to people discrediting you as an unreliable source of information, and can render your opinions meaningless and pointless, as people will tune you out. There are plenty enough real issues, you don’t have to pretend they are something they aren’t for people to listen, quite the contrary.

“dropping backstabs fast enough to do 20k+ damage in a few seconds” though, is patently false. You can only do 1 backstab in a few seconds, it isn’t even mechanically possible to more than one in a few seconds, ever. No amount of personal skill, gear, traits or combination thereof can alter that either. Simply, not, possible.

So again to that whole exaggerating thing. Best practice if you want to be heard? Don’t embellish, it just casts doubt on everything you have to say.

The sad fact is I’m neither lying or embellishing the facts, next time I go down I’ll screen shot the combat logs and post a link to them (I honestly will). But yes I have been hit by thieves fast and hard enough so that I do go down in several seconds (not saying how many since I wouldn’t want to be seen untruthful… but yes just a few) and yes I have looked at my combat log and seen a string of hits ranging from 5-9k each, and further more I do recognize the backstab animation well enough to know that this particular skill is being used often enough that (as in constantly) so that it is most likely the source of that damage (coupled with some really high mugs on occasion).

So you can believe whatever you like however regardless of supposed exaggeration or otherwise that sort of burst is unbalanced plain and simple. In fact the crux of the issue is that thieves can run a complete glass cannon build in WvW and be viable whereas almost every other profession knows that’s suicide and that’s just not okay. So yes, backstab does need some balancing, in fact I’d venture to guess that thieves didn’t care for the redic eviscerates warriors were dropping back in the day and were more than happy to call for some balance on that skill, well now it’s your turn for some balance as well.

Atticus.7194:

next time I go down I’ll screen shot the combat logs and post a link to them (I honestly will).

combat log is not enough to judge the whole situation and therefore invalid, post the whole screen with ur stats, their stats, your build, their build and the exact situation that it happened. Better yet, post a video.

Atticus.7194:

Ravnodaus.5130:

The problem you’re describing Atti, is the rendering issue. I’ve never heard a thief player claim anything other than that it should be fixed asap. We all know it needs to be fixed, everyone admits it… nothing to see, move along. But they’re not actually in stealth longer than intended, for clarity sake you should know the difference. Not rendering in quickly, and being stealthed, are not identical. You may not be able to fully see them, but their location is actually noticeable while unrendered, and they can be targeted while not rendered in too.

Exaggeration leads to people discrediting you as an unreliable source of information, and can render your opinions meaningless and pointless, as people will tune you out. There are plenty enough real issues, you don’t have to pretend they are something they aren’t for people to listen, quite the contrary.

“dropping backstabs fast enough to do 20k+ damage in a few seconds” though, is patently false. You can only do 1 backstab in a few seconds, it isn’t even mechanically possible to more than one in a few seconds, ever. No amount of personal skill, gear, traits or combination thereof can alter that either. Simply, not, possible.

So again to that whole exaggerating thing. Best practice if you want to be heard? Don’t embellish, it just casts doubt on everything you have to say.

The sad fact is I’m neither lying or embellishing the facts, next time I go down I’ll screen shot the combat logs and post a link to them (I honestly will). But yes I have been hit by thieves fast and hard enough so that I do go down in several seconds (not saying how many since I wouldn’t want to be seen untruthful… but yes just a few) and yes I have looked at my combat log and seen a string of hits ranging from 5-9k each, and further more I do recognize the backstab animation well enough to know that this particular skill is being used often enough that (as in constantly) so that it is most likely the source of that damage (coupled with some really high mugs on occasion).

So you can believe whatever you like however regardless of supposed exaggeration or otherwise that sort of burst is unbalanced plain and simple. In fact the crux of the issue is that thieves can run a complete glass cannon build in WvW and be viable whereas almost every other profession knows that’s suicide and that’s just not okay. So yes, backstab does need some balancing, in fact I’d venture to guess that thieves didn’t care for the redic eviscerates warriors were dropping back in the day and were more than happy to call for some balance on that skill, well now it’s your turn for some balance as well.

You seem to be confusing players with professions. Hi, I am a player. I am not a warrior, nor a thief. I’m a real life person and I play a pretty cool video game. You’ve probably heard of it. In this game, I have a bunch of characters that I play, one of them is in fact a warrior, and another is a thief, among several others as well. But I myself am not the profession my character is. Because I’m not confusing a game with reality or misplacing identities in my perceptions of other people playing this same game. I am not delusional, in this sense, and can perfectly differentiate between the two.

I encourage you to try it. Coming to terms with the fact that you’re not talking to a bunch of thieves will probably help in the clarity of your perceptions too. Things like “thieves didn’t care when warriors got a nerf and now it is your turn, haha!” are complete nonsense when you adopt my perspective… and you can see them for what they really are, gibberish from a confused mind.

And finally, to your rebuttal. If you are not lying or embellishing, then you’re simply just wrong. After a thief backstabs, they get a revealed debuff that prevents reentering stealth for exactly 3 seconds. They would then have to use a skill to reenter stealth to be able to backstab again. So it is not possible, in this game, guild wars 2, for a thief to backstab “constantly” or hit with backstab numerous times in a few seconds…. just isn’t possible in the game for it to happen man.

Any attempt you make to say it is happening will show that you really don’t know what is going on at all in combat vs a thief.

bwillb.2165:

crewthief.8649:

Malkavian.3751:

> Designs class around high damage, low survivability
> Nerfs skills and damage repeatability
> Class becomes useless. Can role a warrior and do just as much (or more) damage with much higher survivability. Why play a class with mediocre damage AND low survivability?

Thieves do not have low survivability. If you do, you’re doing it wrong.

Thieves do have low survivability. If you can’t kill a thief, you’re doing it wrong.

Not from what i’ve seen. Countless escapes and harassment of large groups on a fairly regular basis. You need to adjust your analysis. I think you just want to keep your ‘easymode’ to be honest. You can’t possibly be this clueless.

bwillb.2165:

crewthief.8649:

lonewolf.2601:

tagnut.8621:

Most of the thief players i know admit they are very overpowered – and its one of the reasons so many have switched to them.

A nerf – a big one – would be most welcome by 90% of the community.

Sorry but your friends do not how to play this game.
A big nerf would only make things worse for the whole game, but I don’t think anet has the intention to ruin their game, they seem to have learned from other companies mistakes.

Of course not. The only people who know how to play the game are Thief players, right? I know plenty of very good players, and most of them believe Thieves are due a nerf. Sorry to break it to you.

The only people in this conversation that know how to play the game are Thief players. Non-thief players are good at the game too, but they just play the game instead of trying to get nerfs to a class that is obviously not overpowered.

Ichishi.9613:

you demand nerf for a thiefs that can’t do anything to you? or nerf for yourself?

Yes, this seems quite prevalent here… “I can easily kill almost all thieves I run across but NERF THIEVES OMFG!!!!111?”

The ONLY people in this thread that know how to play are Thief players? Really, that’s your argument? So good non-Thief players just play the game, but good Thief players hang around in the forums and respond to threads. Can you see the fatal flaw in your argument? Look around your sub-forum, then look around in the other professions’ sub-forums. No other profession even comes close to the amount of nerf threads as this sub-forum. Where there’s smoke there’s fire. You’re relying on an overpowered profession to carry you in PvP, and you aren’t helping yourself improve any. I’d reiterate WHY it’s overpowered, but that would get me absolutely nowhere with you, so I won’t bother. When the nerfhammer is leveled…you aren’t gonna know what to do. Then YOU’LL be on this board spamming QQ threads.

The issue with thief survivability is that currently it is not working as intended due to the rendering problems. Glass cannon builds have much more survivability then they should as a result. The rendering problems are the biggest issue with thieves, imo. It needs fixing ASAP before they go on a continued nerfing spree to fix what isnt necessarily broken. I say necessarily because it might be or it might not, we have no idea how the profession would play if people were actually revealed coming out of stealth.

crewthief.8649:

You’re relying on an overpowered profession to carry you in PvP, and you aren’t helping yourself improve any. I’d reiterate WHY it’s overpowered, but that would get me absolutely nowhere with you, so I won’t bother. When the nerfhammer is leveled…you aren’t gonna know what to do. Then YOU’LL be on this board spamming QQ threads.

You might be careful what you enjoy, because imo mesmers are thieves with permanent thieves guild and the moment the QQ train shifts from theives, it will be an over night express heading for mesmers. The only reason mesmers are not cried about as much in regards to the rendering issue is because most people are so confused about which is the real you, they haven’t noticed your not there.

Niim.9260:

crewthief.8649:

You’re relying on an overpowered profession to carry you in PvP, and you aren’t helping yourself improve any. I’d reiterate WHY it’s overpowered, but that would get me absolutely nowhere with you, so I won’t bother. When the nerfhammer is leveled…you aren’t gonna know what to do. Then YOU’LL be on this board spamming QQ threads.

You might be careful what you enjoy, because imo mesmers are thieves with permanent thieves guild and the moment the QQ train shifts from theives, it will be an over night express heading for mesmers. The only reason mesmers are not cried about as much in regards to the rendering issue is because most people are so confused about which is the real you, they haven’t noticed your not there.

There was a ton of QQ about Mesmers at launch man, where you been? We were adjusted…several times. The Phantasm build was nerfed, and it needed to be. I’m still playing the profession and will continue to, I appreciate the concept. And I do feel that there are a couple of other things that could use toning down. Moa Morph should have a shorter duration, maybe 5 seconds instead of 10, and Portal needs to be adjusted for sPvP.

Cap backstab damage to 8-10k or something

all problems solved.

I’m using a backstab build which isnt all damage based (i do around 8k backstabs MAX and around 6k on tankier people. 10k on low lvls) which would be useless if you nerf the raw damage of it.

Please dont nerf builds that dont insta gib people !

crewthief.8649:

There was a ton of QQ about Mesmers at launch man, where you been? We were adjusted…several times. The Phantasm build was nerfed, and it needed to be. I’m still playing the profession and will continue to, I appreciate the concept. And I do feel that there are a couple of other things that could use toning down. Moa Morph should have a shorter duration, maybe 5 seconds instead of 10, and Portal needs to be adjusted for sPvP.

Compared to what thieves have been getting since launch, mesmer is not even in the same league. The QQ train has to go somewhere, do you think all these bads will just suddenly figure out the game and enjoy it for what it is? Nope, in my opinion it will be heading straight for mesmer.

That isn’t to say that thieves do not need tweaks, we do just like every class needs some tweaks, but if you look at this forum and read every thread, most of it is uninformed drivel from people that have zero clue what they are talking about and if all the suggestions were implemented you might as well just make us another players pet. Lot’s of stupid thieves with stupid views as well, just in case you think I believe that somehow most of our forum wont be on that same QQ train.

Shizzlenit.7648:

Cap backstab damage to 8-10k or something

all problems solved.

I’m using a backstab build which isnt all damage based (i do around 8k backstabs MAX and around 6k on tankier people. 10k on low lvls) which would be useless if you nerf the raw damage of it.

Please dont nerf builds that dont insta gib people !

Backstab should be at 4k damage on tanky people, which is hell high when considering that it has almost no casting time and a potential external cooldown of 3-4 seconds, and max 6k on squishy targets. Also Mug should deal AT MAXIMUM 2k damage (without considering heavy damage boosting traits).

If Backstab has the damage it has now, it still will be OP considering that thieves have also that lovely skill called Heartseeker. Right now thieves don’t need Heartseeker due to the ridiculous damage of Backstab and Mug, but if Backstab and Mug doesn’t get an huge nerf to raw damage, than the situation would be the same, excluding that thieves needs to use one heartseeker to finish the target down.

man you mad? pistol shot 1 crits for 2k and you want heavy investment abilities to hit same?

Ichishi.9613:

man you mad? pistol shot 1 crits for 2k and you want heavy investment abilities to hit same?

1. Pistol shot crits at maximum for 1k, without considering all damage boosting traits.
2. You define Mug heavy investment ability? Really?

1. Backstab crits for maximum of 6k, without considering all damage boosting traits
2. If mug did autoattack damage it would have been built into a steal initially not a 10-point trait (that i suggest to move to 20-point one, sadly 90% people here do not read thread not starting with “nerf X”)

sorrow.2364:

Shizzlenit.7648:

Cap backstab damage to 8-10k or something

all problems solved.

I’m using a backstab build which isnt all damage based (i do around 8k backstabs MAX and around 6k on tankier people. 10k on low lvls) which would be useless if you nerf the raw damage of it.

Please dont nerf builds that dont insta gib people !

Backstab should be at 4k damage on tanky people, which is hell high when considering that it has almost no casting time and a potential external cooldown of 3-4 seconds, and max 6k on squishy targets. Also Mug should deal AT MAXIMUM 2k damage.

If Backstab has the damage it has now, it still will be OP considering that thieves have also that lovely skill called Heartseeker. Right now thieves don’t need Heartseeker due to the ridiculous damage of Backstab and Mug, but if Backstab and Mug doesn’t get an huge nerf to raw damage, than the situation would be the same, excluding that thieves needs to use one heartseeker to finish the target down.

But backstab is only spamable to an extent. Its not like i can dish out 4-5 backstabs without taking any damage at all. (and we cant take much damage). Also it takes a lot of time to land that many backstabs since we have a cooldown before we can go back to stealth again.

And it is not that easy to land a backstab on good players who know how to evade it. I have to be in stealth and i have to be behind my target… all that effort for 4k damage? I would be better off with auto attacking. And this is not even considering different ways to block it, like the warrior has… or the Guardian… half of my backstabs are missing on a guardian because he has so many ways to block it…

It’s probably very hard for the developers to find the right middle ground because you completely demolish people who dont know how to deal with the constant stealth + backstab but you have a hard time against people who do know how to deal with it.

I’m all for a nerf to the insta kill build the thief has. (Steal + CnD + Backstab + Assa Signet + Basi Venom). But it has to be nerfed in a way that it doesnt completely kill builds that dont use this combo, but still mainly make use of backstab.

For that purpose i proposed trait relocations in “thing that can use buff” thread. please feel free to come there and leave a constructive feedback.
And please make sure that that one remains one of the few where things are considered, not splattered about like here

I think the signet tweak basically solved the backstab burst issue. I think the biggest problem people have now is that thieves can keep backstabbing afterwards. If it was literally a combo you could only do once then those that like big numbers (me) are satisfied, but also making backstab values more… consistent? Meaning those that still die from 1 backstab combo are the ones who have no defensive stats (in which case seriously, what did you expect).

Making backstab cost initiative sounds like a good idea on paper. I think making it a skill with cooldown will solve the problem entirely. d/ gets a new stealth attack that doesnt make people whine about how thieves are op in stealth (eg: who complains about sword stealth daze attack), you cant do the combo, fail, leave, then try again (cd).

Say backstab becomes a utility skill. You have to sacrifice an entire utility skill to backstab. It also has a cooldown. You have to commit to it. How it works like this compared to before is basically the same except the counters people tell you about actually work. As in a stunbreaker will completely screw backstab builds.

What if this skill was like an elementalist glyph, backstab for dagger, i dunno, parry for sword or something (not going into that). Weapon swapping becomes an interesting option (trickery weapon swapping trait?). You can use backstab + HS to gib people at low hp though there are ways to stop that (that are more clear and perhaps easier/more readily available?). Anyways its just an idea.

The main point is people have problems with backstab and nothing else, but thief players feel they’re too squishy and their other weapons aren’t good enough to stand toe to toe with the other classes if they get nerfed any further. I thought the next patch was a balance patch that included changes for thieves. IMO I would just wait until it comes out and we test those changes before saying anything more as I highly doubt they will include anything we say here in the next patch.

Imperator totius Sylvari.9164:

18k on a backstab? That might be able to be done in wvw, and if its a 18k with a backstab, don’t worry… 100b can still hit higher

Dunno what build is but with 3k armour ( not toughness which is 1.9k) plus protection boon and 90% HP ( from 19k HP) got hit by a 16k dmg 2 hit combo by a thief, on top he would also apply conditions on me like poison and bleeding+cripple

having a thief I would love to see the rendering bug go away before they went crazy with the nerfs. It is hard to judge what is or isnt a problem when one thing adds to the other.

For example last night in wvwvw (yeah i know you all want to scream it isnt real pvp!) attacking a fort a thief killed 4-5 people one right after the next only being visiable right after he finished the finisher animation, then gone again 1 second later. So in 15-20 seconds 4-5 people died to a thief that was visable for a total of 4-5 seconds. And no aoe didnt kill him in seconds. as soon as I saw the second go down i aoed on his downed body knowing that was where the thief was. repeat 2-3 more times and it didnt matter.

Being on my elementalist my mind screams nerf them to the ground!!! But then I also stop and think well i was a level 33 elementalist scaled up to 80 and since i was actually looking i could dodge part of it not even seeing the thief. And having a 80 thief not playing a backstab build I feel mostly cripple compared to my 80 guardian and 33 elementalist so this whole thing gets annoying, and it makes playing my thief feel like cheating. I like to pvp and I like to feel good about winning. now half the time it is like well did i beat him because he just couldn’t see me the whole time?

@Wryscher

But that is more of an issue with the rendering and not the thief class itself

Shizzlenit.7648:

But backstab is only spamable to an extent. Its not like i can dish out 4-5 backstabs without taking any damage at all. (and we cant take much damage). Also it takes a lot of time to land that many backstabs since we have a cooldown before we can go back to stealth again.
And it is not that easy to land a backstab on good players who know how to evade it. I have to be in stealth and i have to be behind my target… all that effort for 4k damage? I would be better off with auto attacking. And this is not even considering different ways to block it, like the warrior has… or the Guardian… half of my backstabs are missing on a guardian because he has so many ways to block it…
It’s probably very hard for the developers to find the right middle ground because you completely demolish people who dont know how to deal with the constant stealth + backstab but you have a hard time against people who do know how to deal with it.
I’m all for a nerf to the insta kill build the thief has. (Steal + CnD + Backstab + Assa Signet + Basi Venom). But it has to be nerfed in a way that it doesnt completely kill builds that dont use this combo, but still mainly make use of backstab.

I know you have have a cooldown before you can go in stealth again, but it is only 3 seconds. So, you can theorically use backstab every 4-5 seconds. Considering the high damage it does and the instant casting time, it isn’t that balanced.

You can sure do autoattacking, but when you are autoattacking you actually take more time and you are exposed for that period of time. I don’t know why you feel bad about autoattacking, it should be a consistent part of your fights, not only a placeholder skill chain.

There aren’t people who really knows how to deal with Backstab, it is just a matter of luck. You can avoid the first backstab, sure, but you won’t avoid the second one, mostly because the only way to avoid the first backstab is to cast a blocking/AoE CC skill, both are in a very high cooldown. Consider also that if you miss the first backstab, you are not tied to the 3s stealth cooldown, so you can go in stealth again in a matter of seconds with CnD.
Dodge can’t be considered as a counter, because you have no real clue of when the thief is going to hit you with backstab, plus you have no idea of where the thief is most the time when stealthed, so dodging a backstab is just a matter of luck.

I main as a Necromancer and, as a Necromancer, the only ways to counter a backstab are:
1. Tank the damage in Death Shroud. You can’t use that counter in every situation because Life Force is hard to build and melts down really quicky. Also if you tank one backstab, it is a matter of 5 seconds that another one is landing on your back but, this time, you won’t have any LF left.
2. Casting Reaper Mark on the ground. It can work for just one time, then the thief can attempt to backstabbing you again without the 3 seconds cooldown of Revealed.
3. Using Well of Darkness. It has an huge cooldown and lasts only 5 seconds. Plus, thieves if they don’t land backstab can still go in stealth again without cooldown so you aren’t actually avoiding backstab, just kittending it.

You can see that the counters to backstab are only 3, all those counters aren’t that effective and they are very situational.

Also, it is just fine that you have an hard time against people who knows how to deal Backstab but, right now, you haven’t any hard time at all, against everyone.

sorrow.2364:

Backstab should be at 4k damage on tanky people, which is hell high when considering that it has almost no casting time and a potential external cooldown of 3-4 seconds, and max 6k on squishy targets. Also Mug should deal AT MAXIMUM 2k damage (without considering heavy damage boosting traits).

That’s about how it is already (well, closer to 3k and 5k without assassin’s signet and might stacks). And then backstab does double damage if you put in the effort to fulfill its positioning requirement (which isn’t particularly easy, no matter how much nerf herders will tell you that you can just spam full damage backstabs)
What other class requires having a 3-4 second buff up to be able to do ANY damage with their primary damage skill, and requires proper positioning on top of that to be able to do decent damage?

bwillb.2165:

sorrow.2364:

Backstab should be at 4k damage on tanky people, which is hell high when considering that it has almost no casting time and a potential external cooldown of 3-4 seconds, and max 6k on squishy targets. Also Mug should deal AT MAXIMUM 2k damage (without considering heavy damage boosting traits).

That’s about how it is already (well, closer to 3k and 5k without assassin’s signet and might stacks). And then backstab does double damage if you put in the effort to fulfill its positioning requirement (which isn’t particularly easy, no matter how much nerf herders will tell you that you can just spam full damage backstabs)
What other class requires having a 3-4 second buff up to be able to do ANY damage with their primary damage skill, and requires proper positioning on top of that to be able to do decent damage?

I meant a Backstab on the back, of course.
Anyway, the efforts to pop out that damage is too low. That buff is easily accessible to any D/D thief and proper positioning is also easy to get when considering that most the thieves are running with immobilize venom.

The prize of having good positioning and a buff to deal that damage consists in that you aren’t exposed because of high channeling or building up adrenaline or something like that in order to deal that damage and the casting time is almost instant. There shouldn’t be also a prize on the damage amount.

@sorrow

But i wreck backstab thief on my thief because i know how their build operates. I know when i have to get distance to him because i know when hes going to backstab. It is very easy to avoid when u know how the build operates. I’m playing the build for several hundreds of hours thats why i know it.

Most people i face in WvW just stand still and let me spam backstab because they’re clueless how to deal with it which is understandable, the game is new and you can’t know every counter to a specific build yet or how you have to position urself. But once you do it’s not that hard to avoid.

Shizzlenit.7648:

@sorrow

But i wreck backstab thief on my thief because i know how their build operates. I know when i have to get distance to him because i know when hes going to backstab. It is very easy to avoid when u know how the build operates. I’m playing the build for several hundreds of hours thats why i know it.

Most people i face in WvW just stand still and let me spam backstab because they’re clueless how to deal with it which is understandable, the game is new and you can’t know every counter to a specific build yet or how you have to position urself. But once you do it’s not that hard to avoid.

You can’t know when he is going to backstab at all.
First, because the Steal+CnD+Backstab combo is almost instant, secondly because once the thief goes in stealth, there are 3 seconds (4 if traited) when you have no clue of where the thief is and where you have to point your back.
You can dodge, of course, and maybe you can be lucky enough to dodge at the right time when the backstab is coming, but then, you resolved almost nothing because the thief has no revealed cooldown, he uses CnD again and you are in the same situation. You can be lucky once, but not twice.

Anyway, saying that you can counter thieves using a thief doesn’t help the argument.

@sorrow

Im not talking about the insta gib which is unavoidable (well not completely, basi venom has been nerfed already you can break it now) but it is very hard i agree. But im all for a nerf for this combo since the window to react is way too small and if u fail reacting ure instantly dead.

When the thief goes in stealth you can very well predict where he is because you know where he is heading to -> behind you. And im not talking about dodging the actual backstab, im talking about getting distance so hes unable to backstab you before his stealth runs out. And he has to use the fastest way to get behind you because the stealth doesnt last long. Just because you cant see doesnt mean he isnt there, you can 90% of the time guess where he is because you can predict which way he HAS to take, otherwise he wont be able to land his backstab.

What you wanna do against a pure backstab thief is kiting, you want to kite him all day so he cannot restealth (CnD) and if he cannot restealth he cant backstab. Of course he has some utility which grants him stealth (Blinding Powder for example) but these have a long cooldown.