Guild Wars 2

Shizzlenit.7648:

@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.

Kiting is not an option at all if you consider the cheap leap thieves have as skill 2 on Dagger, so it isn’t that a problem for thieves.

There is a trait on acrobatics, tier 1, Fleet Shadow, which grants you +33% movement speed while stealthed. I know most thieves put everything in offensive attributes but that trait makes all kiting useless when stealthed. Plus you have swiftness on dodge, so..
Also take into account that, due to rendering issues and laggs, the time between CnD and Backstab is minimal and, in most the case, you haven’t enough time to realize the thief vanished when the Backstab comes. Plus, there is Devourer Venom which helps you to land your Backstab if you have problems with.

See, avoiding a backstab isn’t that easy. Considering the damage it does, avoiding it should be way, way easier, as other heavy damage skills are.

sorrow.2364:

Shizzlenit.7648:

@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.

Kiting is not an option at all if you consider the cheap leap thieves have as skill 2 on Dagger, so it isn’t that a problem for thieves.

There is a trait on acrobatics, tier 1, Fleet Shadow, which grants you +33% movement speed while stealthed. I know most thieves put everything in offensive attributes but that trait makes all kiting useless when stealthed. Plus you have swiftness on dodge, so..
Also take into account that, due to rendering issues and laggs, the time between CnD and Backstab is minimal and, in most the case, you haven’t enough time to realize the thief vanished when the Backstab comes. Plus, there is Devourer Venom which helps you to land your Backstab if you have problems with.

See, avoiding a backstab isn’t that easy. Considering the damage it does, avoiding it should be way, way easier, as other heavy damage skills are.

A thief chasing you with heartseeker wont be able to CnD because he has no more Initiative. So he cant restealth -> he cant backstab.

Also EVERY thief is running the +25% passive which makes +33% in stealth useless.

Edit: Just to make that clear, everything i post is based on my WvW experience. I dont play sPvP so i cannot comment on that.

sorrow.2364:

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.

The effort to create this combo is proportional to the skill of the target, with an even matching at the midrange. That is, bad targets are extremely easy to hit with it, average targets are about evenly matched, and skilled targets are extremely hard to hit with it. This is the kind of matching that tactical balance should be going for. Before the basilisk venom nerf you’d be a little more correct, but right now, nothing the thief does is without a reactionary counter. The only REAL problem with the build is the rendering/culling issue, and that’s supposedly being fixed in the next update.

bwillb.2165:

The effort to create this combo is proportional to the skill of the target, with an even matching at the midrange. That is, bad targets are extremely easy to hit with it, average targets are about evenly matched, and skilled targets are extremely hard to hit with it. This is the kind of matching that tactical balance should be going for. Before the basilisk venom nerf you’d be a little more correct, but right now, nothing the thief does is without a reactionary counter. The only REAL problem with the build is the rendering/culling issue, and that’s supposedly being fixed in the next update.

So, as you are saying, the effectiveness of the combo rely only on the target’s skill but not on the caster’s skill. Is this balanced in your opinion?
Of course there are people who can avoid the combo, but you can’t negate that no brain is required to perform that combo and in a competitive environment this isn’t acceptable.

Shizzlenit.7648:

A thief chasing you with heartseeker wont be able to CnD because he has no more Initiative. So he cant restealth -> he cant backstab.

Also EVERY thief is running the +25% passive which makes +33% in stealth useless.

Edit: Just to make that clear, everything i post is based on my WvW experience. I dont play sPvP so i cannot comment on that.

One Heartseeker is more than enough to close the gap, the rest of job is done by the +25% passive speed which every thief is running, as you said.
So, with one Heartseeker, you still have 9 initiative left, which are more than enough to CnD a target.

>>Hellfish said: “The thief is the most overpowered class I’ve ever seen in any MMO and I’ve been playing since the late 90s.”<<

I don’ believe that, but even if it were true, imagine what it would do to the PvE Thieves … they gotta make a livin’ too, ya know.

sorrow.2364:

bwillb.2165:

The effort to create this combo is proportional to the skill of the target, with an even matching at the midrange. That is, bad targets are extremely easy to hit with it, average targets are about evenly matched, and skilled targets are extremely hard to hit with it. This is the kind of matching that tactical balance should be going for. Before the basilisk venom nerf you’d be a little more correct, but right now, nothing the thief does is without a reactionary counter. The only REAL problem with the build is the rendering/culling issue, and that’s supposedly being fixed in the next update.

So, as you are saying, the effectiveness of the combo rely only on the target’s skill but not on the caster’s skill. Is this balanced in your opinion?
Of course there are people who can avoid the combo, but you can’t negate that no brain is required to perform that combo and in a competitive environment this isn’t acceptable.

No, I’m saying that the amount of skill required by the caster is affected by the skill of the target. If the target is bad, the combo doesn’t require much skill. No combo requires all that much skill if the target isn’t actively trying to counter it. However, If the target is good, the combo requires a lot of skill.

hellfish.6740:

The thief is the most overpowered class I’ve ever seen in any MMO and I’ve been playing since the late 90s. It needs to be nerfed way more than it already has. In order to actually compete with a marginally skilled thief you have to completely build your char and setup skills around the idea that you’re always going to be fighting a thief. If you do you’ll have a hard time with other classes and if you don’t thieves will kitten you a hundred times out of a hundred. Even the absolutely crap ones.

Hyperbole much? The thief is about even on overall power with Mesmer and Engineer, and weaker than Warrior.

stop with the “oh noes pve” stuff, Anet is used to split skills for pvp and pve stop complainin about that and btw it IS OP and breaks the game, not by doing just its damage, but getting all thieves, no… all classes that wanna be glasscannon, into that spec, attracted by big numbers.

And on top of that it FORCES other players to build into toughness while they don’t like/want to (especially WvW considering it takes your pve stuff).

And to all the guys that claim “oh I get RARELY beaten by thieves” either the thief was bad, either just got out of another fight, he wasn’t actually a glass cannon, you are a tank build, you have incredibly good reflexes.

I don’t care what you’ll answer to me, can’t you see??? 500+ post worth topic can’t get a community to stop this, THERE IS a problem, just agree with that.

Jack of Tears.9458:

>>Hellfish said: “The thief is the most overpowered class I’ve ever seen in any MMO and I’ve been playing since the late 90s.”<<

I don’ believe that, but even if it were true, imagine what it would do to the PvE Thieves … they gotta make a livin’ too, ya know.

That’s why some skills have different effects in PvE and PvP. It was like that in GW1 and I think they are going to use the same method in GW2.

bwillb.2165:

No, I’m saying that the amount of skill required by the caster is affected by the skill of the target. If the target is bad, the combo doesn’t require much skill. No combo requires all that much skill if the target isn’t actively trying to counter it. However, If the target is good, the combo requires a lot of skill.

This isn’t that true.
The amount of skill required to counter that combo is way higher to the amount of skills required to perform it nicely.
If balance is fine, the amount of skill required to afford the combo should be exactly the same to the amount of skill required to avoid that combo.

You requires lighting reflexes to counter this insta-death combo but what does the thief needs in terms of efforts to perform it? Absolutely nothing.

Just take the Elementalist, for instance. They can kill people, of course, but they have to use the right skills in the right time to succed and the amount of skills required to survive to an elementalist is just the same to the amount of skills required to survive to him.

Also a combo that ends a fight in 2 seconds shouldn’t be in this game and you can imagine why.

sorrow.2364:

This isn’t that true.
The amount of skill required to counter that combo is way higher to the amount of skills required to perform it nicely.
If balance is fine, the amount of skill required to afford the combo should be exactly the same to the amount of skill required to avoid that combo.

You requires lighting reflexes to counter this insta-death combo but what does the thief needs in terms of efforts to perform it? Absolutely nothing.

It’s really not as hard to avoid it as people claim. Certainly not harder than similar-damage-level combos on other classes such as Engineer that aren’t in the limelight. The rendering issues make it harder to avoid than it is meant to be, but that will be fixed next patch, and no one is against fixing that. The backstab combo, as it is implemented, working as intended, is perfectly fine. it’s devastating if you just sit back and let it happen, but it can be devastating to the thief if you actively counter it, which there are many, many, many ways to do, many of which only require hitting a single button, not the perfectly-timed combo people do to get their instant-teleport-stealth-backstab.

Also a combo that ends a fight in 2 seconds shouldn’t be in this game and you can imagine why.

No, why? 2 seconds is more than enough time to react unless you suffer brain damage. Almost all classes, aside from necro, have ways to end a fight quickly. Guild Wars 2 combat is faster than you might be used to seeing in MMOs such as World of Warcraft. That’s not a problem, it’s just how it was designed. Necro needs some fixes to be able to compete in fast combat, but other than that it’s fine.

Maybe you don’t realize how other classes can be powerful because you don’t see such a high damage in 1 number (like backstab), but actually they are.

Here an example of how a burst mesmer can do 16K in few seconds (or istantly) – watch at 0.25.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wJWYncz5gUE

Blurried Frenzy: 6624
Shatters: 2700 for each x 4 = 10800

Kerishan.8460:

Maybe you don’t realize how other classes can be powerful because you don’t see such a high damage in 1 number (like backstab), but actually they are.

Here an example of how a burst mesmer can do 16K in few seconds (or istantly) – watch at 0.25.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wJWYncz5gUE

Blurried Frenzy: 6624
Shatters: 2700 for each x 4 = 10800

Hehe I like how he enters combat by using all of his weapon skills right away, switching weaponsets, and then using all of his weapon skills right away. But people claim “oh thieves have it easy with their initiative”. Really? I can’t use all 10 of my weapon skills in quick succession… That could explain a lot about why people can’t counter thieves, though, if they’re doing this.

Kerishan.8460:

Maybe you don’t realize how other classes can be powerful because you don’t see such a high damage in 1 number (like backstab), but actually they are.

Here an example of how a burst mesmer can do 16K in few seconds (or istantly) – watch at 0.25.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wJWYncz5gUE

Blurried Frenzy: 6624
Shatters: 2700 for each x 4 = 10800

Look at the amount of skills and action he has to do to deal that burst and see how many visual clues there are that this burst is coming.
Thieves can deal that damage in half the time, half the skills, no preparation and almost no visual clue. Bad comparison.

Still have to see any footage of any profession excluding thieves killing people in 1-2 seconds.

because it takes 0.25 to summon 3 clones, survive a moa morph and cast the shatters (which are evoidable by simply strafing into them) and do the flurry which sticks you in place right?

Man seriously do the maths before comparing a mesmer (LOL) to a thief, do you actually want to compare a whole, avoidable, killable, hard to pull, setup to a simple auto-positioning-skill clik?

Look at the amount of skills and action he has to do to deal that burst

look at how many of those skills and actions were just face-rolling everything as soon as it came off of cooldown.

Still have to see any footage of any profession excluding thieves killing people in 1-2 seconds.

There was one a couple weeks ago of an engineer that could get people 100-0 in less than a second by timing projectiles to hit simultaneously.

Rfreak.6591:

because it takes 0.25 to summon 3 clones, survive a moa morph and cast the shatters (which are evoidable by simply strafing into them) and do the flurry which sticks you in place right?

Who said it takes 0.25seconds? He gets one clone up, then gets hit with the insanely OP Moa (which is another mesmer skill, by the way). The moa ends at 0:24, he starts attacking again at 0:26, the playback slows down drastically to show what’s going on, and the target is downed at 0:30. Total time needed (not counting the time he was Moa’d since that would screw up anyone) to cause the burst that kerishan quoted: about 2-3 seconds.

Rfreak.6591:

do you actually want to compare a whole, avoidable, killable, hard to pull, setup to a simple auto-positioning-skill clik?

Oh, do mesmers have a skill that automatically positions them? The first part of your comparison was obviously describing the thief with a specific perfectly timed combo to perform, not the faceroll mesmer, but I don’t know what the second part could be…

@bwillb
I’m obviously refering to heartseeker and steal

What I was sayin was, that the mesmer has to hit quite a number of skills to reach the damage thieves can get in one hit, and on top of it, it’s quite avoidable, not to mention those clones are weak and will get blasted almost always before hitting the target, and the mesmer is stuck from the flurry while doing it, sure you get the distortion, yet the enemy can run out of it.

If you are actually refering to skill-3 of mesmer sword then… would you seriously compare it to thieves’ heartseeker? consindering it’s THAT conditional and, again, clones die easily? AND it’s not an instant skill, but has to be placed and then activated again in order to trigger the positioning effect? given you are actually placed where you wanted to?

Also I have yet to see a mesmer being able to kill any1 all alone in 1v1 even with a moa morph.

bwillb.2165:

Look at the amount of skills and action he has to do to deal that burst

look at how many of those skills and actions were just face-rolling everything as soon as it came off of cooldown.

Still have to see any footage of any profession excluding thieves killing people in 1-2 seconds.

There was one a couple weeks ago of an engineer that could get people 100-0 in less than a second by timing projectiles to hit simultaneously.

Face rolling? Does it really come from a thief?
Anyway the burst well done was just one, in which no clone was killed and no dodge was used, the other ones were just average bursts. The visual sign of that burst is coming is obvious, all clones and phantasms rushing into your position -> dodge.
You can also use an AoE to kill all clones and cut down the burst to only 8k or less damage, which isn’t enough to kill any player, then the Mesmer has every skill on cooldown and no way to escape (= dead).

The Engineer footage was done in WvWvW against leveled up people, not worth mentioning.

PS: obviously this doesn’t mean Mesmer needs some work too.

@sorrow

I’d also like to point out that the footage you guys are refering to, clearly shows how hard it is to avoid the grenade toolbelt skill. It’s just hard as hell to use it correctly and on top of it in order to use it you have to hit:
1-a sitting duck OR
2-a net-shot opponent, which is quite hard on aware players

That net just screams “DODGE ME!”

Still, grenades get thrown at random, which means even thought all conditions are met, you still have a great chance to miss your target (for the whole damage, which, is what makes the burst worth it)

Rfreak.6591:

@bwillb
I’m obviously refering to heartseeker and steal

Heartseeker doesn’t automatically position you, it just gets you closer. And steal, while it does put you adjacent to the target, does NOT automatically put you behind the target. If you’re not behind the target, your backstab is wasted.

What I was sayin was, that the mesmer has to hit quite a number of skills to reach the damage thieves can get in one hit, and on top of it, it’s quite avoidable, not to mention those clones are weak and will get blasted almost always before hitting the target, and the mesmer is stuck from the flurry while doing it, sure you get the distortion, yet the enemy can run out of it.

The mesmer burst used two attacks, the backstab thief burst uses two attacks. Both
use additional utility to increase the damage done.

If you are actually refering to skill-3 of mesmer sword then… would you seriously compare it to thieves’ heartseeker? consindering it’s THAT conditional and, again, clones die easily? AND it’s not an instant skill, but has to be placed and then activated again in order to trigger the positioning effect? given you are actually placed where you wanted to?

I wasn’t actually referring to any specific mesmer positioning skill. But since you brought it up, that’s actually a pretty good comparison. Double-tapping it is a non-issue. It has almost 50% longer range than heartseeker. And mesmer doesn’t need to be behind the target to deal their burst, while thief does, and heartseeker does not provide that unless the target is already turned away from you.

bwillb.2165:

Rfreak.6591:

@bwillb
I’m obviously refering to heartseeker and steal

Heartseeker doesn’t automatically position you, it just gets you closer. And steal, while it does put you adjacent to the target, does NOT automatically put you behind the target. If you’re not behind the target, your backstab is wasted.

What I was sayin was, that the mesmer has to hit quite a number of skills to reach the damage thieves can get in one hit, and on top of it, it’s quite avoidable, not to mention those clones are weak and will get blasted almost always before hitting the target, and the mesmer is stuck from the flurry while doing it, sure you get the distortion, yet the enemy can run out of it.

The mesmer burst used two attacks, the backstab thief burst uses two attacks. Both
use additional utility to increase the damage done.

If you are actually refering to skill-3 of mesmer sword then… would you seriously compare it to thieves’ heartseeker? consindering it’s THAT conditional and, again, clones die easily? AND it’s not an instant skill, but has to be placed and then activated again in order to trigger the positioning effect? given you are actually placed where you wanted to?

I wasn’t actually referring to any specific mesmer positioning skill. But since you brought it up, that’s actually a pretty good comparison. Double-tapping it is a non-issue. It has almost 50% longer range than heartseeker. And mesmer doesn’t need to be behind the target to deal their burst, while thief does, and heartseeker does not provide that unless the target is already turned away from you.

I have well over 500 hours as a mesmer,

Comparing heartseeker to sword 3 is a joke.

Sword 3 on a mesmer works maybe 25% of the time the way it’s intended. 75% of the time you wind up no where near your target.

Don’t believe me? Go use it for 2 weeks. I’ve mained mesmer since launch and know how it works quite well, that being it barely works ever.

You can find plenty of mesmers complaining about it intheir threads.

Heartseeker is about 100x’s easier to use and WAY WAY more effective.

sorrow.2364:

bwillb.2165:

Look at the amount of skills and action he has to do to deal that burst

look at how many of those skills and actions were just face-rolling everything as soon as it came off of cooldown.

Still have to see any footage of any profession excluding thieves killing people in 1-2 seconds.

There was one a couple weeks ago of an engineer that could get people 100-0 in less than a second by timing projectiles to hit simultaneously.

Face rolling? Does it really come from a thief?

Yup. Thieves aren’t the hardest class to play, but we certainly can’t afford to just hit every skill we have as soon as combat starts.

Anyway the burst well done was just one, in which no clone was killed and no dodge was used, the other ones were just average bursts.

Same thing on thieves. Occasionally you’ll get a huge burst against someone who doesn’t bother to counter at all, other times it’s just average. The videos showing off thief burst are cherry-picked engagements.

The visual sign of that burst is coming is obvious, all clones and phantasms rushing into your position -> dodge.

The visual cue on backstab is slightly less obvious, I’ll give you that, but it’s still there if you’re observant.

You can also use an AoE to kill all clones and cut down the burst to only 8k or less damage, which isn’t enough to kill any player, then the Mesmer has every skill on cooldown and no way to escape (= dead).

There are several ways to counter backstab and cut it down significantly (or completely) as well. And in those cases, the thief is left with everything on cooldown and little-to-no initiative.

The Engineer footage was done in WvWvW against leveled up people, not worth mentioning.

so are most of the Thief videos I’ve seen.

@bwillb

Did we ever mention backstab?

We are refering to thieves damage/effort in general, which are already enough to prove what we are discussing

Rfreak.6591:

@bwillb

Did we ever mention backstab?

We are refering to thieves damage/effort in general, which are already enough to prove what we are discussing

This whole thread was about the looming backstab nerf…
What thief skill can come anywhere near that mesmer burst other than backstab?

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.

Wow, condescending much?

Well first off your comment about my supposed confusion between a character and the person playing it has no real bearing on my comments and from what I can tell serves to allow you to attempt to belittle me and nothing more so please stop. Just because I use the common vernacular “You might be doing something” or “your ability” instead of saying “your character is able to do something” or “your characters ability” doesn’t invalidate my comments (and frankly it’s really petty).

Also my mention about eviscerate was to hopefully provide some perspective that thieves really aren’t being singled out amongst all other professions by calling for reappraisal of a skill that seems a bit overpowered in conjunction with several other factors like thieves extreme mobility/survivability.

And finally while I’m really not going to get dragged into a semantics debate with you I think most would agree that however or why ever thieves are able to run a full glass cannon build in WvW and remain viable is frankly a bit much. Through out this thread many many players have pointed some of the amazing things thieves (not the players playing them but the profession itself which is not to say in anyway I am referring to the person playing the profession and not the profession itself and it’s inherent abilities which are limited to the profession and not the player (happy?)) are able to do right now and all together it’s just a bit much, so all I’m mentioning is that some of this just needs balancing, your character shouldn’t be considered dead on sight if a thief sees you and you’re running anything but a fairly “tanky” build.

EDIT: Also once more, really… tone down the condescension please you’re laying it on really thick and it’s not appreciated. If I’m wrong well that’s fine that’s certainly a possibility however at no point do I (or anyone else) ever need you looking down your nose at anyone else trying to make them feel like kitten in a constructive conversation.

bwillb.2165:

Yup. Thieves aren’t the hardest class to play, but we certainly can’t afford to just hit every skill we have as soon as combat starts.

That’s true, you just need to hit 3 skill to get the same result.

bwillb.2165:

Same thing on thieves. Occasionally you’ll get a huge burst against someone who doesn’t bother to counter at all, other times it’s just average. The videos showing off thief burst are cherry-picked engagements.

It isn’t a matter of people who don’t bother to counter at all, it is a matter of people who CAN’T counter at all because of laggs, rendering issues and the incredible short time thieves’ burst take.

bwillb.2165:

The visual cue on backstab is slightly less obvious, I’ll give you that, but it’s still there if you’re observant.

Absoltely not. The visual clue of backstab is almost non-existent, if you use also the trait which puts you in stealth on steal, there is no visual clue at all.

bwillb.2165:

There are several ways to counter backstab and cut it down significantly (or completely) as well. And in those cases, the thief is left with everything on cooldown and little-to-no initiative.

So, list those way. I mean, hard counters, those kind of counters that don’t allow the thief to repeat that burst 3 seconds after.

bwillb.2165:

so are most of the Thief videos I’ve seen.

Really? Just search on youtube “backstab thief” and you’ll see an huge amount of 20k+ bursts in sPvP/tPvP.
Here’s one I’ve randomly found using that query and looking for most recent videos.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvH9IA97bzw

bwillb.2165:

Rfreak.6591:

@bwillb

Did we ever mention backstab?

We are refering to thieves damage/effort in general, which are already enough to prove what we are discussing

This whole thread was about the looming backstab nerf…
What thief skill can come anywhere near that mesmer burst other than backstab?

Unload.
3 Unloads on full power/crit thief can deal up to 16k damage and leave you with every skill on recharge. Plus, it doesn’t use utility slots.

The argument that if you see a theif coming at you and he stealths, you’re able to anticipate his moves, potentially allowing you to negate or at least partially negate his backstab combo while true, ignores the fact that most times you never see the theif coming. Most times you have zero indication that a theif is even on his way to kill you. You can argue that this comes from lack of situational awareness, but this is most times untrue. A theif can easily stealth while you’re distracted or simply not looking in his direction. If when the combo was landed you were given more than a second to react perhaps there would still be some balance, but the fact that once the combo starts you’re dead almost instantly is unbalanced. I’m not even going to argue that it takes no skill to perform the combo because that’s irrelevant. Any combo that potentially allows you to kill someone while giving them essentially zero chance to defend themselves is clearly unbalanced. Killing people wearing vit gear in three hits with an excess of 26k health, regardless of armor type, before they can react is clearly unbalanced. People have this misconception that all of the other classes are conspiring against them, and want them to be nerfed to the point where they are unusable, because for some reason they harbor an irrational hatred towards the theif class. This is quite obviously entirely untrue. People aren’t attacking the theif class as a whole, they’re attacking certain unbalanced aspects of it. They aren’t being “Haters.” People are simply asking for a more balanced game, and one that rewards skill, experience, and strategy.

sorrow.2364:

It isn’t a matter of people who don’t bother to counter at all, it is a matter of people who CAN’T counter at all because of laggs, rendering issues and the incredible short time thieves’ burst take.

But that’s no different from the mesmer.

Absoltely not. The visual clue of backstab is almost non-existent,

Okay, feel free to believe that instead of trying harder.

if you use also the trait which puts you in stealth on steal, there is no visual clue at all.

I’ve not seen a single backstab-burst thief with that trait. It requires 20 points into shadow arts, which is a tree that is mostly useless for glass cannon thieves.

So, list those way. I mean, hard counters, those kind of counters that don’t allow the thief to repeat that burst 3 seconds after.

No. Do your own research and experimenting. The counters are quite easy to pull off, if you know them you can do them, so just spouting them off would be saying “here’s every weakness I have” and that’s not very sportsmanlike. Ever played poker? A card shark playing against you isn’t going to tell you “When I rub my nose, it means I have good cards.”

Unload.
3 Unloads on full power/crit thief can deal up to 16k damage and leave you with every skill on recharge. Plus, it doesn’t use utility slots.

Aaaand you’re done talking.

bwillb.2165:

sorrow.2364:

It isn’t a matter of people who don’t bother to counter at all, it is a matter of people who CAN’T counter at all because of laggs, rendering issues and the incredible short time thieves’ burst take.

But that’s no different from the mesmer.

Nope, you have more than 5 seconds of warning of the burst coming, when mesmer is spamming his clones. You don’t have this with thieves.
Also, it isn’t affected by stealth rendering issues.

The mesmer burst is also very situational, because there is no real immobilization.

Absoltely not. The visual clue of backstab is almost non-existent,

Okay, feel free to believe that instead of trying harder.

Try what? Do I have to use the power of Force? See the real nature of things? Do I have to see not only with my eyes?

bwillb.2165:

if you use also the trait which puts you in stealth on steal, there is no visual clue at all.

I’ve not seen a single backstab-burst thief with that trait. It requires 20 points into shadow arts, which is a tree that is mostly useless for glass cannon thieves.

20-30-20-0-0
Here you have your burst glass cannon thief with also some survivability.
Oh, I gave you such a pro tip, shame on me

bwillb.2165:

So, list those way. I mean, hard counters, those kind of counters that don’t allow the thief to repeat that burst 3 seconds after.

No. Do your own research and experimenting. The counters are quite easy to pull off, if you know them you can do them, so just spouting them off would be saying “here’s every weakness I have” and that’s not very sportsmanlike. Ever played poker? A card shark playing against you isn’t going to tell you “When I rub my nose, it means I have good cards.”

That’s because there is no real counter, nothing can prevents a thief to repeat his burst if the first one failed.

Unload.
3 Unloads on full power/crit thief can deal up to 16k damage and leave you with every skill on recharge. Plus, it doesn’t use utility slots.

Aaaand you’re done talking.

Try Unload from yourself.

To be honest at this point it doesnt really matter.

I have gotten instant killed by pretty much every class. Just today i’ve got hit by a Whirlwind that drained half of my hp instantly and that is just one fricking button (i have 19,2k hp on my thief). I have seen Eles that do so much dps i got downed in seconds, etc. etc. Every class can spec a lot of burst (maybe the necro not so much) but it doesnt really matter. You will always have people to complain a certain thing.

The devs said they will look into it so some change is coming but we dont know what they are going to change. I just hope they dont kitten up builds that dont take advantage of that insta gib combo.

Lets wait and see whats going to happen, this discussion is senseless at the moment anyway.

I agree with the title of this thread. Stop the nerfs. Thieves are increadibly weak (I say this having played all the other classes) and the only way a thief can survive is to become a glass cannon. If Arenanet is going to nerf the only viable way to use a thief then they really should just remove the class from the game, chalk it up to a design failure, and move on so everyone can have fun.

I’m starting to wonder if you guys ever played anything that deals just about 1k per hit or even less… It’s not that you HAVE to do insane damage in order to win, actually that’s wrong, it’s the same as a click-kill on other sub-par-gear based-mmos.

Try out a condition thief instead and you’ll see that, not only its damage’s pretty cool, but you also have lots of survivability, and initiative.

It may be true that you are not left with many options but that will be undoubtly fixed, just that bugs need to go first.

Sadly I feel like all posts in this thread (including this one) is pointless. People ignore good points and evidence against their stance, and try to avoid intelligent discussion like the plague. Nothing said in here will convince anyone. This thread probably has the most irrational posts/posters I’ve seen in the GW2 forums.

Rfreak.6591:

just that bugs need to go first.

I completely agree with you there. Bugs need to go first. Before buffs, and also BEFORE NERFS. Fix the bugs, and then see where we stand.

Add weapon sets. Buff other classes.

Then we’ll talk.

Yes let’s make Warriors be able to do more than 16k with 100b!
Or let’s make Mesmers be able to do even less but still lol their way around your corpse!
I get it now, let’s give D/D ele’s more combo finishers they can set up by themselves to give buffs/cure conditions/heal etc.
Or did you want to give Necro’s another button to give them yet another full bar of HP?

Ok ok, I tend to get sarcastic.
Rangers really do need a buff.
And I still lol everytime I see a guardian that tries to be funny with a damage build.

sorrow.2364:

bwillb.2165:

sorrow.2364:

It isn’t a matter of people who don’t bother to counter at all, it is a matter of people who CAN’T counter at all because of laggs, rendering issues and the incredible short time thieves’ burst take.

But that’s no different from the mesmer.

Nope, you have more than 5 seconds of warning of the burst coming, when mesmer is spamming his clones. You don’t have this with thieves.
Also, it isn’t affected by stealth rendering issues.

The mesmer burst is also very situational, because there is no real immobilization.

Absoltely not. The visual clue of backstab is almost non-existent,

Okay, feel free to believe that instead of trying harder.

Try what? Do I have to use the power of Force? See the real nature of things? Do I have to see not only with my eyes?

bwillb.2165:

if you use also the trait which puts you in stealth on steal, there is no visual clue at all.

I’ve not seen a single backstab-burst thief with that trait. It requires 20 points into shadow arts, which is a tree that is mostly useless for glass cannon thieves.

20-30-20-0-0
Here you have your burst glass cannon thief with also some survivability.
Oh, I gave you such a pro tip, shame on me

bwillb.2165:

So, list those way. I mean, hard counters, those kind of counters that don’t allow the thief to repeat that burst 3 seconds after.

No. Do your own research and experimenting. The counters are quite easy to pull off, if you know them you can do them, so just spouting them off would be saying “here’s every weakness I have” and that’s not very sportsmanlike. Ever played poker? A card shark playing against you isn’t going to tell you “When I rub my nose, it means I have good cards.”

That’s because there is no real counter, nothing can prevents a thief to repeat his burst if the first one failed.

Unload.
3 Unloads on full power/crit thief can deal up to 16k damage and leave you with every skill on recharge. Plus, it doesn’t use utility slots.

Aaaand you’re done talking.

Try Unload from yourself.

Basilik venom and the giant circle of a signet appearing over a thief’s head is an easy indicator if when he’s about to use his burst.

Same.4687:

Yes let’s make Warriors be able to do more than 16k with 100b!
Or let’s make Mesmers be able to do even less but still lol their way around your corpse!
I get it now, let’s give D/D ele’s more combo finishers they can set up by themselves to give buffs/cure conditions/heal etc.
Or did you want to give Necro’s another button to give them yet another full bar of HP?

Ok ok, I tend to get sarcastic.
Rangers really do need a buff.
And I still lol everytime I see a guardian that tries to be funny with a damage build.

Here’s my thoughts on overall balance, once bugs are fixed:
All Classes: reduce quickness effect to be 50% increased attack speed.
Warrior: Nerf HP and greatsword damage, introduce more reactionary options and a combo field.
Mesmer: Keep mostly how they are, aside from obvious bugfixes. Add a mainhand pistol option.
Thief: Revert pistol whip nerf, buff pistol mainhand a bit, add a slow 2h rifle option focused on long-range shutdown and a defensive offhand sword option. Rebalance steal to provide less benefit but be usable more often.
Ranger: Revert shortbow auto-attack nerf, improve pet AI, remove self-root/tracking from sword auto-attack.
Elementalist: Keep overall power the same, but reduce minimum skill level needed to be competitive. Add a greatsword option that is medium-short range focusing on wide cone attacks and ground-stab PBAoE attacks.
Necromancer: Nerf health slightly, increase availability of short-term dps (burst). Improve pet AI. Allow the necromancer to temporarily possess one of his pets (keeping his own life bar, boons and conditions), going incognito and gaining monster skills for a very short time.
Engineer: Add a 2h hammer option. With explosions. Done.

The spike and conditions when need to preq a backstab are fine

-Backstab (Have to be in stealth, and have to be behind the player)
-Upon doing the backstab your revealed for 3 seconds and can not go back to stealth

Seems fine to me

Whats not OK is C&D/MUG/STEAL/BASILISK Combo. When performing this combo this is what happens:

-You teleport to the player from 900range instantly (This is the strongest of all the things that happen in this combo and is vital to making it instagib)
-You steal an ability
-You gain 3 initive (usually) refilling the ini lost when casting C&D which then allows another 10% damage for having above 6 ini when traited
-You gain stealth for 3 secs
-You usually Crit with both MUG and C&D getting them below 50% health so Executioner applies another 20% damage
-MUG does good damage (To good for a 10 point trait)
-C&D does good damage on crit
-If MUG and C&D do both crit in that second upon landing, it does more damage than the backstab
-The player is immobilised for 1.5 secs instantly

This takes 1.5 sec to achieve setting you up for a super massive backstab

Fix the combo casting mechanic and you balance the thief without nerfing anything

Its clear that the strength to this build is the combo setup and not the backstab itself

-Webley: Played Backstab thief long enough to give you good information on it

Webley.1295:

-You teleport to the player from 900range instantly (This is the strongest of all the things that happen in this combo and is vital to making it instagib)

It’s important to note that it doesn’t necessarily teleport you to the enemy’s backside. So unless the enemy is already facing away from you, you still have to fiddle with running around the enemy before you can get the most out of your combo.

-MUG does good damage (To good for a 10 point trait)

I’m not sure but I think there may be an occasional bug in the calculation on that one. Mine usually only does like 1k or less on a crit but sometimes its more like 5k. Much more variance than I see in most skills. Should definitely be looked into and fixed if there is an error.

Fix the combo casting mechanic and you balance the thief without nerfing anything
it

by “combo-casting mechanic” do you mean the mechanic that lets you cast an instant attack while channeling another? I think that’s working as intended, but I could be fine with changing that as long as its an across-the-board change.

Other than that, I think the situation is fine. That’s 4+ skills and an entire trait pool dedicated to helping that one burst. Other classes are still capable of the same level of burst, some even without dedicating as much towards it. But I think just fixing the bugs involved would go a long way towards evening out the big picture.

bwillb.2165:

Webley.1295:

-You teleport to the player from 900range instantly (This is the strongest of all the things that happen in this combo and is vital to making it instagib)

It’s important to note that it doesn’t necessarily teleport you to the enemy’s backside. So unless the enemy is already facing away from you, you still have to fiddle with running around the enemy before you can get the most out of your combo.

-MUG does good damage (To good for a 10 point trait)

I’m not sure but I think there may be an occasional bug in the calculation on that one. Mine usually only does like 1k or less on a crit but sometimes its more like 5k. Much more variance than I see in most skills. Should definitely be looked into and fixed if there is an error.

Fix the combo casting mechanic and you balance the thief without nerfing anything
it

by “combo-casting mechanic” do you mean the mechanic that lets you cast an instant attack while channeling another? I think that’s working as intended, but I could be fine with changing that as long as its an across-the-board change.

Yea the channeling of one skill and being allowed to cast another is the one that allows the burst of MUG and C&D. Getting them down to 50% allows the executioner 20% extra damage trait to go crazy on backstab which you well know as much as me is what we want to finish

If channeling wasnt fixed and MUG was changed to a burning condition which did flat out large damage and wasnt effected by crit etc and took time to burn out its damage we would have a still viable build with backstab in it.

I wouldnt mind working a little harder for the backstab. I always just shadow step out anyway if it doesnt go right or cloak and dagger. Problem is it always goes well. We need to work harder.

in sPvP or tPvP venom builds are preferred over BS builds just like defensive guards are preferred over glass cannon guards. but in WvW, BS is just to great in its current form. Setting it up is just to easy for me and many others.

Ive been playing with my BS build not using the C&D/STEAL combo and its much more fun and rewarding, and you can totally see how it would work. Fights are actually fights, and not just a large gank on cooldown

The fact that this is being defended is sad.

Hey look, A wild screenshot appeared with absolutely no detail except for the death breakdown. With nothing about your build, their build and the overall circumstances of your death, your argument is meaningless. Its like me turning up to a court case and my only evidence against someone is my own word.

I play shatter mesmer in tpvp.

Bursting in shatter mesmer is constant and has only 10 second cooldown. Using sigil of energy and dodge rolling to create clones you can spam more mind wrecks.

The video you posted does not even do the maximun damage. You can chain Mirror Images and Decoy to use Cry of Frustration during channel of Blurred Frenzy, after Mindwreck hits.

FrozenLuv.6017:

Hey look, A wild screenshot appeared with absolutely no detail except for the death breakdown. With nothing about your build, their build and the overall circumstances of your death, your argument is meaningless. Its like me turning up to a court case and my only evidence against someone is my own word.

No his argument is rock solid. 13k in a single hit from stealth. Let’s look at worst case scenario and it’s a glass cannon with the lowest health, that’s an INSTANT KILL. How are you justifying that? Even a glass cannon should live through a bunch of hits. In this case the poster is a necromancer, that’s 18k base HP. Assuming the thief has stealth on steal his 2 hit combo with steal doing 7.7k and backstab doing 13.1k for a total of 20.8k damage. That’s 2 shotting the highest base HP glass cannon classes. The only argument you can even remotely make is whether it’s fair that glass cannon classes die in 1-2 hits. If you win that argument then of course all other classes/builds need buffed to match that balancing level. I’d love to see your face when you hit necro marks on the ground that instant kill you, but lets hope ArenaNet doesn’t go that route.

I am a thief and this stuff needs fixed before it ruins the class. 7.7k steal is OP, 13.1k backstabs from stealth are OP, 6.6k C&D is OP. There is NO justification, glass cannon or otherwise, for that kind of damage. That goes for all classes with super high burst. People want fights where they can actually react, use skills, and put up a fight; currently that is not happening because of classes like the thief that drop nearly any build in a few seconds. There is no skill in 1-2 hitting and that makes PvP unfun and boring.

Distaste.4801:

FrozenLuv.6017:

Hey look, A wild screenshot appeared with absolutely no detail except for the death breakdown. With nothing about your build, their build and the overall circumstances of your death, your argument is meaningless. Its like me turning up to a court case and my only evidence against someone is my own word.

No his argument is rock solid. 13k in a single hit from stealth. Let’s look at worst case scenario and it’s a glass cannon with the lowest health, that’s an INSTANT KILL. How are you justifying that? Even a glass cannon should live through a bunch of hits. In this case the poster is a necromancer, that’s 18k base HP. Assuming the thief has stealth on steal his 2 hit combo with steal doing 7.7k and backstab doing 13.1k for a total of 20.8k damage. That’s 2 shotting the highest base HP glass cannon classes. The only argument you can even remotely make is whether it’s fair that glass cannon classes die in 1-2 hits. If you win that argument then of course all other classes/builds need buffed to match that balancing level. I’d love to see your face when you hit necro marks on the ground that instant kill you, but lets hope ArenaNet doesn’t go that route.

I am a thief and this stuff needs fixed before it ruins the class. 7.7k steal is OP, 13.1k backstabs from stealth are OP, 6.6k C&D is OP. There is NO justification, glass cannon or otherwise, for that kind of damage. That goes for all classes with super high burst. People want fights where they can actually react, use skills, and put up a fight; currently that is not happening because of classes like the thief that drop nearly any build in a few seconds. There is no skill in 1-2 hitting and that makes PvP unfun and boring.

If you think theres no skill in 1-2 hitting then don’t play this build, its simple as that. This is one instance of backstab hitting for 13k. Also is the screenshot before or after the sin sig nerf, because with the new sin sig, its impossible to hit for 13k bs in sPVP. Many people in this thread have states over and over and over again that thieves can’t hit for that high anymore, but no one listens, just nerf nerf nerf nerf nerf. These numbers r obviously either pre-patch or rigged. stop taking sides before thinking about it logically and knowing the full story.

The screen shot was taken today my friend, you can claim it doesn’t happen all you want.
The fact that you say it is rigged shows the level of delusion we are dealing with.

Silk.2813:

The screen shot was taken today my friend, you can claim it doesn’t happen all you want.
The fact that you say it is rigged shows the level of delusion we are dealing with.

Ok, now we have the date, how about some stats now, or r you gonna keep us all in suspense.

One of the big paradigm changes between GW1 and GW2 was that the innate passive survivability of classes was to be greatly increased, so that you wouldn’t die to massive degen or crits quite as fast as in the first game.
Abilites that are ably to threeshot (let alone one- or twoshot) other players severely undermine this principle. So I am in favour of a damage nerf to some, particularly dagger specific, skills.
And yes, I am a thief as well. Our class already has a notorious reputation in sPvP for being gimmicky and having an extremely low skill ceiling, is this really what we want?

Silk.2813:

The screen shot was taken today my friend, you can claim it doesn’t happen all you want.
The fact that you say it is rigged shows the level of delusion we are dealing with.

Now tell us what class and equipment you were using.