I make a lot of assumptions in this thread based on personal observation only. I don’t have specific numbers. However, having spent quite a bit of time in WvW, SPvP, TPvP, and general PvE, either playing thief or watching other thieves, I feel that my observations aren’t completely wrong. Most thieves run extremely similar builds – it’s rare to see a venomshare thief or an evade tank thief. The vast majority of thieves I see do direct damage based on high precision and critdmg%. As well, almost every thief uses a shortbow. These two components of thief gameplay have become stale to the point where I feel they’re one of the classes with the least originality in build composition. This thread is about me musing why, and if it’s a problem. It’s a bit of a long read, but I’d prefer you read everything before responding.
The shortbow on thief is often dictated as a must-have by most experienced thieves. Some of the thief’s only AoE, a spammable blast finisher, a pulsing poison field that will apply weakness if the thief has 15 in deadly arts, a spammable evade and a teleport are all featured on one weapon. It’s hard for any of the other thief’s weapon options to outweigh this kind of utility. Typically, only niche builds can get away with not using the shortbow. It’s just too good.
By too good, I don’t mean it should be nerfed. But for one weapon to be used to the exclusion of so many other weaponsets is by definition a balancing problem. Thief players don’t just magically gravitate toward a certain weaponset for no reason. It’s unarguably one of the best weapons that the thief has, solely based on its utility.
The question that then comes next to my mind is based off that. The shortbow is used mainly for its utility. It excels only in ranged AoE dps. Single target ranged damage still belongs in the realm of p/p, highest dps and highest AoE dps both belong to the sword, and melee burst belongs to the dagger. If you always take the shortbow, just for a backup weapon, you’re giving up a lot of options.
In looking at what might be causing so many thieves to so heavily favor the shortbow over all his other sets, I tried to imagine the shortbow if thief was just another class that had to play by the cooldown system instead of his initiative system. I thought it might look something like this:
Cluster Bomb: 10 second recharge.
Disabling Shot: 15 second recharge.
Choking Gas: 20 second recharge.
Infiltrator’s Arrow: 35 second recharge.
Of course, I can’t read Arenanet’s mind. I don’t know what the thief would be like if he used cooldowns. However, I think these numbers aren’t too far off what the weapon might be like.
As you can see, with everything on a cooldown system, the thief no longer has easy access to 2+ teleports, he can no longer spam blast finishers or hefty AoE damage, and he can only use a single evade before it’s put on cooldown. To me, this is now a mediocre weapon. The autoattack isn’t enough to justify using this weapon.
In other words, what’s probably already become apparent to many people already, the thief occupies a unique space in the world of Guild Wars 2 combat. He can stay in one weaponset indefinitely yet still be contributing just as much as any other party member due to his unique initiative system. A thief never needs to swap weapons because all his skills are on cooldown, because his cooldown system is tied to his person, rather than his weapons.
Because of this, weaponswapping becomes a rather less important factor in combat for the thief, and so many of them will take one set for damage, and the other set for utility, rather than say, a warrior, who might take a greatsword and an axe, both physical damage melee weapons with little utility, but he has to do this to output maximum damage. If hundred blades, rush, and whirlwind attack are all on cooldown, the warrior has to switch weapons just to keep up the melee pressure. If a thief wants to keep up melee pressure, all he has to do is stay in his same weaponset, and he is never in danger of being in the “wrong” weaponset at an inopportune time.
As a mechanic, I personally believe this is overpowered and bad for dynamic combat and build composition. There has been a lot of complaining about spamming skills and doing large amounts of damage while pushing single buttons. You probably haven’t played enough sPvP if you haven’t seen one of these people: The majority of complaints come from the thieves that spam a single skill, usually Heartseeker, Pistol Whip, or Unload.