Guild Wars 2

It’s simple, applies 1 stack of confusion in an aoe on stealth. Fits with the whole going invis to throw your opponent off and helps both condi and power thieves (condi more but no one can say no to free dmg, same reason I already love the poison on d aa chain).

I’d be thrilled if they replaced last refuge with giving us vigor for 5s on stealth. It doesn’t make sense to me that a class designed to be “evasive” for its defense has (correct me if I’m wrong) exactly one source of vigor: 8 secs of vigor when you heal from the acrobatics trait line. More please.

Silver.4798:

I’d be thrilled if they replaced last refuge with giving us vigor for 5s on stealth. It doesn’t make sense to me that a class designed to be “evasive” for its defense has (correct me if I’m wrong) exactly one source of vigor: 8 secs of vigor when you heal from the acrobatics trait line. More please.

Bountiful Theft – Stealing provides you and allies near your 15 seconds of vigor. Up to 2 boons are also ripped and given to nearby allies. – 20 Point Trickery trait.

On Topic:

I’d go for something more defensive to be honest; Vigor on stealth, Protection on revealed, Protection on stealth etc. Something to actually make going stealth a defensive move (Vigor = More dodges to actually be able to dodge the hits thrown at you when stealthed. Also reduces the need to go 15 Acro to be able to actually get additional defence). Due to the inherent problems with using Stealth vs a good player (In that the good player will continue to attack the thief, thus rendering their only defence being dodging, which other classes can often do more of via high uptime of Vigor)

Heck, the possibility of moving Meld with Shadows to the 5 point trait and adding a new 15 point trait is still there (Non-stealth orientated thieves get some but not a massive amount of boost from the additional second of stealth, allowing for a more dedicated stealth orientated minor trait to be put in for those that go 15 points in)

Taril.8619:

I’d go for something more defensive to be honest; Vigor on stealth, Protection on revealed, Protection on stealth etc. Something to actually make going stealth a defensive move (Vigor = More dodges to actually be able to dodge the hits thrown at you when stealthed. Also reduces the need to go 15 Acro to be able to actually get additional defence). Due to the inherent problems with using Stealth vs a good player (In that the good player will continue to attack the thief, thus rendering their only defence being dodging, which other classes can often do more of via high uptime of Vigor)

While I agree with you that some sort of boon would be nice, protection on/after stealth would be ridiculously OP in any stealth build. Protection while revealed because of a protection after stealth trait would make stealth thieves too difficult to kill even with a landed CC.

Incurafy.6329:

While I agree with you that some sort of boon would be nice, protection on/after stealth would be ridiculously OP in any stealth build. Protection while revealed because of a protection after stealth trait would make stealth thieves too difficult to kill even with a landed CC.

Depends on the duration and interaction.

If it’s something like the Shadow Protector trait in which the boon doesn’t stack with anything (It won’t refresh itself, it doesn’t apply if the boon is already on you from another source)

Also, if it’s short duration (Such as 2-3 seconds, covering not all of stealth duration or not all of revealed) with an internal cooldown (To prevent abuse via stealth combo’s and Shadow Refuge) it would make it useful, without being as ridiculous as the Boon classes (Guardian + Elementalist)

Taril.8619:

Silver.4798:

I’d be thrilled if they replaced last refuge with giving us vigor for 5s on stealth. It doesn’t make sense to me that a class designed to be “evasive” for its defense has (correct me if I’m wrong) exactly one source of vigor: 8 secs of vigor when you heal from the acrobatics trait line. More please.

Bountiful Theft – Stealing provides you and allies near your 15 seconds of vigor. Up to 2 boons are also ripped and given to nearby allies. – 20 Point Trickery trait.

On Topic:

I’d go for something more defensive to be honest; Vigor on stealth, Protection on revealed, Protection on stealth etc. Something to actually make going stealth a defensive move (Vigor = More dodges to actually be able to dodge the hits thrown at you when stealthed. Also reduces the need to go 15 Acro to be able to actually get additional defence). Due to the inherent problems with using Stealth vs a good player (In that the good player will continue to attack the thief, thus rendering their only defence being dodging, which other classes can often do more of via high uptime of Vigor)

Heck, the possibility of moving Meld with Shadows to the 5 point trait and adding a new 15 point trait is still there (Non-stealth orientated thieves get some but not a massive amount of boost from the additional second of stealth, allowing for a more dedicated stealth orientated minor trait to be put in for those that go 15 points in)

nothing wrong with that but imo, love the vigor idea, but there’s something I like to call an offensive defence. When someone isn’t willing to attack you due to your imposing threat, it’s an offensive defence. You don’t need protection when fewer people are swinging their twilights blindly in circles, trying to find you.

Also I feel the protection idea is pretty bad, no offence. It’s just that thief was designed to dance and dodge around you opponent, not taking the hits, always 1 step ahead. Then again though, I don’t feel that ele should be able to get any protection outside earth… but then you look at d/d and think wtf.

randomfightfan.4091:

nothing wrong with that but imo, love the vigor idea, but there’s something I like to call an offensive defence. When someone isn’t willing to attack you due to your imposing threat, it’s an offensive defence. You don’t need protection when fewer people are swinging their twilights blindly in circles, trying to find you.

The concern I have with that, is what happens if someone for example, stacks up a massive amount of condition damage (I looked up a build with 2k Condition damage through Carrion gear (So additional power as well)) and uses the perma-stealth CnD spam tactics to keep applying 414 damage confusion stacks in an area.

Thus allowing them to single-handedly shut down groups of people (They won’t want to attack at the thief, nor would they want to engage in group fights as taking 414 damage per attack they deal is pretty strong especially if cleanses are nulified via re-application every 3 seconds)

Considering that before those thieves only had bleeds to work with (which did nothing due to super easily obtainable cleanses), I wouldn’t feel the least bit bad about giving them 1 stack of confusion every few seconds. Makes it so it’s not super easy to completely nullify a build’s entire souce of dps (not to mention what would happen if you were stacking those against a necro or mes :s Feel bad for the thief already).

randomfightfan.4091:

Considering that before those thieves only had bleeds to work with (which did nothing due to super easily obtainable cleanses), I wouldn’t feel the least bit bad about giving them 1 stack of confusion every few seconds. Makes it so it’s not super easy to completely nullify a build’s entire souce of dps (not to mention what would happen if you were stacking those against a necro or mes :s Feel bad for the thief already).

Just get 15 points in deadly arts and your bleeds aren’t easy to clean anymore, cause every choking gas, every steal and every spider venom attack, you throw out, will create 2 cover conditions.

randomfightfan.4091:

Also I feel the protection idea is pretty bad, no offence. It’s just that thief was designed to dance and dodge around you opponent, not taking the hits, always 1 step ahead. Then again though, I don’t feel that ele should be able to get any protection outside earth… but then you look at d/d and think wtf.

I agree that thieves should be kept around the Evasive theme it’s just there’s limited amount of defensive boons – Regeneration, Vigor, Protection and Aegis.

Add in that there are 2 Shadow Arts traits that provide Regeneration (One conflicts with other sources of Regeneration) and the lackluster/overpowered nature of Aegis (1 application will only prevent a single attack, unless it’s 1 application per second in stealth which would get pretty powerful)

Leaving only Vigor (May be too strong for other builds if a 5 point trait, such as the Endless Dodging builds and other Acro focused builds) and Protection (Allowing stealth to be used defensively against people who can track stealth would increase the ability for Thieves to be played in competitive PvP)

randomfightfan.4091:

Considering that before those thieves only had bleeds to work with (which did nothing due to super easily obtainable cleanses), I wouldn’t feel the least bit bad about giving them 1 stack of confusion every few seconds. Makes it so it’s not super easy to completely nullify a build’s entire souce of dps (not to mention what would happen if you were stacking those against a necro or mes :s Feel bad for the thief already).

Well, without confusion the thief playstyle I outlined only had Cloak and Dagger and Vulnerability to play with (Talking about CnD > CnD > CnD >CnD thieves which have been complained about) allowing these thieves to provide confusion would make it a viable (Also mostly safe, Carrion build can get over 20k health easily and with people not wanting to attack often…) way of doing huge AoE damage in PvP without providing much in PvE (PvE stuff tends to hit slowly and only trigger 1-2 ticks of the average confusion)

take out the cheesing stealth ability then and make all non-thief classes and keep all non-cheesing thieves not unhappy. 3s revealed but revealed every time you leave stealth. Problem solved.

Also if someone is just doing CnD over and over on a condition build, the thief will be perma in melee range but only doing maybe MAYBE 1k CnDs. Not much of a problem. Very easily ignorable and if the thief even can’t make it for a cnd or misses one, then you have a very good chance to melt them.

randomfightfan.4091:

Also if someone is just doing CnD over and over on a condition build, the thief will be perma in melee range but only doing maybe MAYBE 1k CnDs. Not much of a problem. Very easily ignorable and if the thief even can’t make it for a cnd or misses one, then you have a very good chance to melt them.

With Carrion gear in the cheese exploiting build I looked at (2k power, 2k condi damage) the CnD would hit for about 1.5k damage on a lot of targets (Non-crit due to no precision) but the main focus would be the huge AoE damage caused by the Confusion (As it is currently the CnD spam is awful due to how little it achieves, a Confusion build would be able to actually perform a role both solo and in group encounters)

Also, CnD thief doesn’t need to be in perma-melee due to having 3 seconds to wander around, leaving melee range and re-entering (Since targets won’t be able to see where the thief is moving, not all will be able to move away from the thief)

If the thief misses/can’t get off a CnD, they can pop Blinding Powder/Shadow Refuge to give them stealth (Since they won’t need any utilities to actually peform this combo)

Which also brings up another good point, Shadow Refuge and multiple stacks of Confusion brought on. Depending on the duration of the Confusion it could get anywhere between 3-5 stacks of confusion (1242 – 2070 damage per tick with the previously mentioned Carrion build)

my idea:

blind all nearby enemies 600 radius + gain 50% endurance

My idea:

Thief’s head explodes, instantly killing him and robbing the enemy of their kill, the last refuge of safety from people beating on you = death!

In seriousness though, just making it one of the selectable ones and putting anything else there instead would probably be the easiest system.

Keep the blind nearby enemies without making it blinding powder. Add a minor effect such as :
- vigour for a few seconds
- swiftness for a few seconds (although this might run people off cliffs)
- cure a condition or specific conditions

Why not just make Last Refuge drop a smoke field instead if stealth?

drop a smoke field and lose 3 conditions maybe?
(bargaining mode activated)

If it’s truly a last refuge it should just ignore revealed.

Taril.8619:

With Carrion gear in the cheese exploiting build I looked at (2k power, 2k condi damage) the CnD would hit for about 1.5k damage on a lot of targets (Non-crit due to no precision) but the main focus would be the huge AoE damage caused by the Confusion (As it is currently the CnD spam is awful due to how little it achieves, a Confusion build would be able to actually perform a role both solo and in group encounters)

Also, CnD thief doesn’t need to be in perma-melee due to having 3 seconds to wander around, leaving melee range and re-entering (Since targets won’t be able to see where the thief is moving, not all will be able to move away from the thief)

If the thief misses/can’t get off a CnD, they can pop Blinding Powder/Shadow Refuge to give them stealth (Since they won’t need any utilities to actually peform this combo)

Which also brings up another good point, Shadow Refuge and multiple stacks of Confusion brought on. Depending on the duration of the Confusion it could get anywhere between 3-5 stacks of confusion (1242 – 2070 damage per tick with the previously mentioned Carrion build)

your 1st point is valid but the thief would mostly feel like dead weight. If it’s in a group situation, the confusion would hit the max spread of 5 targets and be easily cleansable. You’d need to be swapping in sbow for chocking gas and caltrops to be not so cleans able and actually do decent damage. If you do this then you can’t be chaining your CnD as either you’ll still be stuck on sbow or have no ini for CnD. Also, if you need caltrops then you lose out on getting roll for ini or shadowstep. You now rely solely on stealth for being safe. If they realize where you are and drop aoes on you… you’re dead. In solo, you’d be a mild annoyance at best. Only real option with this build is to troll bad players and make them waste their time chasing you. Being a shatter mesmer, even a condition shatter would bet better than this.

2nd. True you are able to want but you’re still susceptible to aoes and auto attacks. Not as easy as it sounds.

Your last point is very solid and I’d have no idea how to counter it (especially if there were multiple thieves going invis and stacking their srs’) No idea how to counter that but I also don’t know if there’s many people willing to do that sort of coordination to melt zergs. Don’t believe me? How often do you see a group of 5 mesmers confusion shatter a zerg to try and confusion melt them? And even if there were a group like that, how often do the confusions stick without the other 30 enemies cleansing for the targets?

randomfightfan.4091:

If it’s in a group situation, the confusion would hit the max spread of 5 targets and be easily cleansable.

Not a lot of classes can cleanse something every 3 seconds, and due to how being perma-stealth is combined with multiple targets (AoE Confusion on stealth means it shouldn’t matter which target you use CnD on) should give decent stay-ability during a crowd allowing multiple uses of CnD for AoE confusion spam. In a group encounter people are less likely to cleanse off the easily re-applied Confusion and instead wait for the conditions from other classes.

This viability shouldn’t be allowed to be gained from a CnD spamming thief (They shouldn’t really be able to do much, if anything since it’s a awful tactic offensively) it should require getting the Revealed debuff in order to cause damage, otherwise people can get taken down by targets they won’t be able to see (If timed correctly the stealth debuff will drop for less than half a second before re-application, if timed perfectly that time becomes non-existent, not even accounting for the perma stealth from BP > HS builds which can provide multiple stacks at a time with the downside of having an obvious location)

That isn’t to say CnD > CnD shouldn’t be available for non-cheese builds to allow defence in highly dangerous situations.

2nd. True you are able to want but you’re still susceptible to aoes and auto attacks. Not as easy as it sounds.

True, but Auto-Attacks would be less likely if the idea is for confusion to cause an increase in survivability via people not wanting to attack (Auto-attack spamming with confusion on can cause a very quick death to people. Especially those with fast auto-attacks) and AoE’s would be the biggest danger though with the ability to move around freely, use Dodges (The build I was looking at went 30 into Acro) and also the higher Health from Carrion gear (Also the heal skill, Withdraw can be used to evade, Hide in Shadows can cause more Confusion, provide regeneration and allow for more time to reposition)

Your last point is very solid and I’d have no idea how to counter it (especially if there were multiple thieves going invis and stacking their srs’) No idea how to counter that but I also don’t know if there’s many people willing to do that sort of coordination to melt zergs. Don’t believe me? How often do you see a group of 5 mesmers confusion shatter a zerg to try and confusion melt them? And even if there were a group like that, how often do the confusions stick without the other 30 enemies cleansing for the targets?

Hopefully there won’t be too many Multi-Thief stacking groups (Though I dare say they’d be some) since there are also other ways to provide similar zerg busting (The mentioned 5 Mesmer, also X Thief + 4-5 x/D Elementalists using Churning Earth from Shadow Refuge) but the amount of confusion a single thief could provide when using it is a bit too high. Especially when the common response from Thieves to non-Thieves complaining about Shadow Refuge tends to be “Just spam skills inside it to hit the thief”

Not a lot of classes can cleanse something every 3 seconds, and due to how being perma-stealth is combined with multiple targets (AoE Confusion on stealth means it shouldn’t matter which target you use CnD on) should give decent stay-ability during a crowd allowing multiple uses of CnD for AoE confusion spam. In a group encounter people are less likely to cleanse off the easily re-applied Confusion and instead wait for the conditions from other classes.

I meant that as in a zerg situation where you have warriors, guardians, necros, rangers, and eles doing mass cleanses all the time. If this wasn’t happening constantly, aoe conditions would rule wvw