Guild Wars 2

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.

The typical response to the people that complain is “L2P! They can be countered!”.

However, just because something can be countered doesn’t mean it’s balanced – and even if it’s balanced, it’s pretty boring. I’ve played a thief a lot, and I enjoy pressing single buttons and getting large numbers. But thief gameplay takes it a level beyond just “easy damage”.

In even high level thief gameplay, such as rank40+ tournament play, it’s typically not about executing amazing and unexpected combos, it’s just setting up enemies as much as possible so you can repeatedly press your most damaging skill. Any other class has to rely on rotations rather than spamming just one or two skills, due to cooldowns.

I personally feel that spamming one attack over and over to the exclusion of others is by definition unbalanced. I don’t feel I’m alone when I say that rotations make for a more dynamic and appealing gameplay. The problem arises when trying to apply rotations to the thief, who has no cooldowns and can spam whatever he wants when he wants.

I do like the initiative system a lot, and I feel it adds something unique to the class. However, I feel it’s broken in the current implementation. It says something that every thief, even the most glass cannon thief considers 15 in Trickery almost mandatory, just for the 3 initiative – despite the fact that the traitline doesn’t offer much in the way of damage.

To diversify the system, I would return the initiative pool to 10 points. The trickery traitline would offer only a single extra initiative point.

However, in compensation, the thief’s initiative would be restored each time he swapped weapons. Either completely restored, or partially. In essence, each weaponset would have its own separate initiative points. With this system, you could no longer spam 2 for quite so long, but you would actually have more initiative, encouraging weaponswapping and dynamic combos rather than constantly just spamming 2 or 3 on one weaponset. It would also encourage more diversified weaponsets, due to the fact that the thief would no longer be able to rely on just one set to do all the damage for him.

I’d love to hear any legitimate thoughts or replies or incoherent flaming about the current state of the thief. I feel it needs a major rework in order to bring it in line with the rest of the classes, giving it more utility but less spammability in order to create a solid class with multiple viable roles rather than just “damage”.

Why cooldown? Because u wanna again ppl crying about how op would be thief with cooldown and not with initiative?

Initiative have a good point and bad point, if u let thief spam 10 skill in a row like other class thief can be the most powerfull in this game, let initiative like is now is better for everyone.

Oh and for who said “10 ini and 1 point in trick and regeneration on swap” i say "all class can spam 5 skill, then swap and spam 5 skill, thief simply can’t.

Thanks for clearly not reading the entire thing before responding. I never made any mention of changing thief skills to a cooldown system.

You also have the opposite. Thief is the class that can spam the 5 skill the MOST out of any other class. Even if you swap weapons, that skill is typically on a 25+ second cooldown, much longer than a single weapon swap. For a thief, he just needs to wait a few seconds for 5-6 initiative, then he can use his skill again.

I’m ticking this in the category of “Senseless kneejerk reaction.”

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.

The initiative system allows our profession to use their most damaging skills multiple times – however it comes at a huge cost in terms of initiative.

So you can’t blame thieves for choosing the most damaging skill when it is offered to them on a platter – but you must remember that they lose anywhere from 25% to 50% of their initiative in doing so. So because of that cost it is not overpowered..

As a Ranger (L80) I chose to almost always use auto-attack short bow spam because it was my most damaging attack, not because I liked going pew pew pew pew and having no variety in my attack.

People will always choose the most damaging attack they can come up with – that’s why skills get spammed constantly – because there is always 1 skill that sits above the rest. Backstab, Pistol Whip, 100 blades, Kill Shot etc…

That’s how thief is. It’s different. Initiative comes with advantages. You can spam whatever you want until you run out of initiative. And disadvantages. When you’re out of initiative, you’re out. You can’t use any skills (except 1, obviously) until you regenerate some, and even then you can only use them as fast as your initiative recovers. I don’t see how this is a problem.

People have mentioned that spamming high-damage skills comes at the cost of initiative, but not why that is important.

While other professions may utilize a rotation, they gain all of the utility benefits entailed by using all the skills in that weapon set. What thieves trade, via use of initiative and time on high-damage skills, is the opportunity to utilize utility. If S/P, for instance, was cooldown based, fighting a thief using it would see a lot more blind/daze/immobilize use, simply because those abilities would be used when they come off cooldown. As it stands, a decision to go heavy damage as a thief is one done via skill selection, foregoing utility for more direct offense. Conversely, other professions “specialize for damage” mostly via traitlines and equipment.

Look i posted this in thief feedback before:

Thief has 2 weapeon sets:
Lets say shortbow and d/d

Lets say thief has 12 innitiative(basic)

He starts dpsing with d/d

CnD>backstab>HS>HS>HS=o innitiative.(stupid combo though)(counting 3 innitiative that regenerated while executing the combo)

If you arent dead he can only autoattack, Swaping to bow lets you only autoattack with bow.

He has 4 options:

1.Fight with autoatacks and hope to finish off.
2.Stealth via utility.(he can run or try to continue fighting, its up to him)
3.Run away via utility(shadowstep)
4. Regenerate innitiative Via utility(roll for innitiative, Which is also his stunbreaker)

The outcome of this is 1 main weapeon for combat and secondary weapeon for utility and niche situations.

Also thief has to pack much more defencive utilitys then any other class, as they cannot stand toe to toe withouth invisibility against any class in fair and square battle.

I myself pack defencive heal(with invis), 3 defencive utilitys + elite skill(which i swap depending on battles, but ussual Dagger storm is defencive too)

What other class packs 3+ defencive utilitys.

I have red everything and here is what i have to say:
1.I don’t use Shortbow and i don’t need it.I use D/D+P/D(go figure)
2.Nobody(in right mind) complains about spammable skills,especially in TPvP.When i see thief spamming HS(or Unload),i am glad,because i see 15 points,coming to me.
3.The unique Thief initiative system which many people try to present as OP is in fact it’s biggest curse.Because the fact,that thief can use 1 skill several times dooms him to have mediocre skills for eternity(also he pays the price of little to no synergy between many of the skills,even from same weapon sets).Thief will never have knockbacks,or stability,or knockdown,invulnerabilty e.t.c.And off course this is right.Imagine a Thief with Spamable Shield Bash.
The skills that are really good can be counted on 1 hand:HS,PW,IA,IS,CD,CB(some people have 6 fingers).Spamming some of them is kinda very rewarding(HS is not what i mean).The next group are skills,very useful,but only at the right moment(Black Powder,Head Shot). While spamming them is possible,it’s pointless.It will only empty thief’s initiative and at the end he will again die.The third group are the completely trash skills(Body Shot is a typical member).
4.I am currently rank 41,so i also think,that my observations aren’t completely wrong.

Initiative is a double edged sword. Yes it allows the no brain thiefs to go CnD, BS, HS, HS, HS and if their enemy isn’t dead by then. They are dead OR they blow every defensive CD they have to try and get away.

However where any other class can do a nice rotation of skills to keep stuff going, thieves cannot. If you do not manage your initiative any variable in a fight is going to cause trouble (another player, defensive CD’s etc). If anything initiative makes playing a thief at high levels harder than people that can do rotations while not having to worry about variables as much as thieves.

I think you missed a factor of Thief’s combat. The reason why so many D/D thieves go 222222 until they exhaust themselves. Take a look at the D/D weapon set, it has Heartseeker, a leaping gap closing damage skill which is tilted towards being a killing blow, Death Blossom, a evading Whirl finisher that stacks on bleeding, yet can only be used 2-3 times in rapid succession. Then there’s Dancing Dagger, a bouncing AoE cripple which recently received a large nerf to its damage, and finally Cloak and Dagger, a melee strike that on-hit applies stealth on hit and has also taken a large damage nerf. You should notice that the weapon set has 2 skills that deal are tilted towards doing damage, and 2 skills that are tilted towards thier secondary effect. Now observe the S/D set, Infiltrator’s Strike/Shadow Return, a low damaging skill that shadowsteps the user to their target and can be used again to stunbreak the user back to their initial position, Flanking Strike, a skill evades then strikes for medium damage and strips a boon from its target with an unblockable strike, the last two skills are Dancing Dagger and Cloak and Dagger again. Now lets straight up compare these two sets. D/D, one power/crit damage skill, one condition damage skill, 2 utility skills, and for S/D, 4 utility skills. I propose your chang won’t change much for thieves as a whole. The HS spammers will still spam HS, BS thieves won’t be effected, DB would actually be stronger this way, and S/D would be at least a little less survivable. So I can’t see your change helping things in the long run.

Revamp all traits to be useful.

Pistols:
Vital Shot – No cool-down (Double Firing Rate.) [It can now do damage!]
Body Shot – 2 second cool-down. (Increase damage by 150%.) [Finally its useful!]
Unload – 6 second cool-down. (Increase damage by 150%.) [It does less damage then sword autoattack…]
Headshot – 8 second cool-down. (Increase damage by 350%.) [Seriously, it does 84 base damage…)
Black Powder – 10 Second cool-down. (Increase damage by 250%.) [Seriously, it does 84 base damage…)
Sneak Attack – Increase base damage and bleed duration damage by 50%.)

Daggers:
Double Strike/Chain – No cool-down. (Increase Poison Duration by 25%.)
Heartseeker – 2 second cool-down. (No Damage Change, its fine.)
Death Blossom – 6 second cool-down. (Increase power (not bleed.) damage by 250%.)
Dancing Dagger – 8 second cool-down. (Increase damage by 120%)
Cloak And Dagger – 10 second cool-down. (Increase damage by 50%.)
Backstab – Damage is fine, however make it to where it stuns the target if you hit them from the back instead of doing more damage, front/back damage should be the same.

Short Bow:
Trick Shot – No Cooldown – (Double Firing Rate.) [It can now do damage!]
Cluster Bomb – 2 second cool-down. (Increase damage and bleed duration by 15%.)
Disabling Shot – 6 second cool-down. (increase power damage by 150%.)
Choking Gas – 8 second cool-down. (Increase poison duration by 25%.)
Infiltrator’s Arrow – 10 second cool-down. (Increase range to 1200.)
Suprise Shot – Increase range to 1500, increase damage to that of kill-shot, remove immobilize.

Daecollo.9578:

Revamp all traits to be useful.

Pistols:
Vital Shot – No cool-down (Double Firing Rate.) [It can now do damage!]
Unload 6 second cool-down. Increase damage by 150%.) [It does less damage then sword autoattack…]
Headshot – 8 second cool-down (Increase damage by 350%.) [Seriously, it does 84 base damage…)
Black Powder -10 Second cool-down. (Increase damage by 250%.) [Seriously, it does 84 base damage…)
Sneak Attack – Increase base damage and bleed duration damage by 50%.)

Daggers:
Double Strike/Chain – No cool-down. (Increase Poison Duration by 25%.)
Heartseeker – 2 second cool-down. (No Damage Change, its fine.)
Death Blossom – 6 second cool-down. (Increase power (not bleed.) damage by 250%.)
Dancing Dagger – 8 second cool-down. (Increase damage by 120%)
Cloak And Dagger-10 second cool-down. (Increase damage by 50%.)
Backstab – Damage is fine, however make it to where it stuns the target if you hit them from the back instead of doing more damage, front/back damage should be the same.

Forget cooldowns.

And about unload doing 150% more damage…. have you gone mad ? i mean rly… It now does 6k or so damage on glass cannon if it hits whole and you are speced as glass too.

It would do 15k on glass cannons w/o stacks of might blodlust stacks and stuff. With all that could be 20k damage from 1 skill… a ranged non rooting Hundred blades.

Yeah right…

Stin.9781:

Daecollo.9578:

Revamp all traits to be useful.

Pistols:
Vital Shot – No cool-down (Double Firing Rate.) [It can now do damage!]
Unload 6 second cool-down. Increase damage by 150%.) [It does less damage then sword autoattack…]
Headshot – 8 second cool-down (Increase damage by 350%.) [Seriously, it does 84 base damage…)
Black Powder -10 Second cool-down. (Increase damage by 250%.) [Seriously, it does 84 base damage…)
Sneak Attack – Increase base damage and bleed duration damage by 50%.)

Daggers:
Double Strike/Chain – No cool-down. (Increase Poison Duration by 25%.)
Heartseeker – 2 second cool-down. (No Damage Change, its fine.)
Death Blossom -* 6 second cool-down*. (Increase power (not bleed.) damage by 250%.)
Dancing Dagger -* 8 second cool-down.* (Increase damage by 120%)
Cloak And Dagger -10 second cool-down. (Increase damage by 50%.)
Backstab – Damage is fine, however make it to where it stuns the target if you hit them from the back instead of doing more damage, front/back damage should be the same.

Forget cooldowns.

And about unload doing 150% more damage…. have you gone mad ? i mean rly… It now does 6k or so damage on glass cannon if it hits whole and you are speced as glass too.

It would do 15k on glass cannons w/o stacks of might blodlust stacks and stuff. With all that could be 20k damage from 1 skill… a ranged non rooting Hundred blades.

Yeah right…

UNLOAD DOES 3-4k Damage against bunkers and is a slow channal, very easy to avoid. – And costs “5”, FIVE initiative. (because it fires 8 times for 199 damage, this means if the enemy has toughness/protection it contests against every shot and makes each shot do very little.

My Sword Autoattack Chain does 6500 damage if I hit with it, and Unload does not even give the thief evasion.

Unload is very slow and channals and snares the thief, and offers no evasion and is easilly dodged, you also can’t run away while you use it because if you turn around it cancels unload.

Pistols do not pierce and are not AOE attacks, Unload isn’t an AOE Attack nore does it pierce like rifle, it should atleast do MORE damage then Volley (Rifle), and Volley can be traited to pierce (be an AOE attack.) and has 1200 range!

Also, Thiefs do not have nearly the traits dedicated to pistols as rifle has, pistol attacks do not pierce, and only have 900 range and do very low damage compared to rifle shots, that means toughness/protection boons contest against them harder since its lots of tiny shots instead of bigger shots, Warriors have heavy armor and more traits dedicated to make Rifle Shots Critical More/Bleed More/Do More Damage.

Remember, Pistol/Pistol has no access to stealth besides Utility, and that Utility has to be used for movement speed (signet of shadows.) and getting away (shadowstep), that leaves room for little to no stealth.

Hundred Blades roots you and is an AOE attack, has 6 second cooldown if traited for it, and grants might on each critical hit, and has a very high chance (80-90%) to critical due to many traits warrior has, the warrior also has heavy armor.

Unload snares you for 50% and is NOT an aoe attack, would have an 8 second cooldown and a much lower chance to critical (60%.), the thief also has medium armor and pistol/pistol thief has little to no access to stealth.

Both attacks break channal if you try to move around too much.

Unload has 900 range, but is not an aoe attack, and the user has less armor.

Yes, make Thief exactly the same as every other class, that´s great idea….

Or you can return to WoW and have this now and without forum whining….

Daecollo.9578:

Stin.9781:

Daecollo.9578:

Revamp all traits to be useful.

Pistols:
Vital Shot – No cool-down (Double Firing Rate.) [It can now do damage!]
Unload 6 second cool-down. Increase damage by 150%.) [It does less damage then sword autoattack…]
Headshot – 8 second cool-down (Increase damage by 350%.) [Seriously, it does 84 base damage…)
Black Powder -10 Second cool-down. (Increase damage by 250%.) [Seriously, it does 84 base damage…)
Sneak Attack – Increase base damage and bleed duration damage by 50%.)

Daggers:
Double Strike/Chain – No cool-down. (Increase Poison Duration by 25%.)
Heartseeker – 2 second cool-down. (No Damage Change, its fine.)
Death Blossom -* 6 second cool-down*. (Increase power (not bleed.) damage by 250%.)
Dancing Dagger -* 8 second cool-down.* (Increase damage by 120%)
Cloak And Dagger -10 second cool-down. (Increase damage by 50%.)
Backstab – Damage is fine, however make it to where it stuns the target if you hit them from the back instead of doing more damage, front/back damage should be the same.

Forget cooldowns.

And about unload doing 150% more damage…. have you gone mad ? i mean rly… It now does 6k or so damage on glass cannon if it hits whole and you are speced as glass too.

It would do 15k on glass cannons w/o stacks of might blodlust stacks and stuff. With all that could be 20k damage from 1 skill… a ranged non rooting Hundred blades.

Yeah right…

UNLOAD DOES 4k Damage against bunkers and is a slow channal, very easy to avoid. – And costs “5”, FIVE initiative. (because it fires 8 times for 199 damage, this means if the enemy has toughness/protection it contests against every shot and makes each shot do very little.

My Sword Autoattack Chain does 6500 damage if I hit with it, and Unload does not even give the thief evasion.

Unload is very slow and channals and snares the thief, and offers no evasion and is easilly dodged, you also can’t run away while you use it because if you turn around it cancels unload.

It does 199 on paper. When might stacks + dmg traits, critical rate + critical damage comes to mind each hit goes around 350 damage-750+ critical on power precision.(Average hit does 600 if i take 50% critical rate(runes of divinity). and 62% crit damage)

600 hiting 8 times does basicly 5k damage, on Spvp not minding WvW where stats can be much highter. And thats if you take runes of divinity not the best damage runes.

5k*(100% +150% that you propose) is 12500 damage… Withouth might stacks, fury, stacks of Bloodlust.
You can haste it to cast it in 1.5 seconds. You want ranged Hundred blades equivalent skill. Which thiefs thanks to innitiative mechanic(which is well though) could spam and you want support ?

In WvW doing 20k with best gear foods with 114% crit dmg and so on. Oh 1 skill 1 dead , lets cast it on another now.

Stin.9781:

Daecollo.9578:

Stin.9781:

Daecollo.9578:

Revamp all traits to be useful.

Pistols:
Vital Shot – No cool-down (Double Firing Rate.) [It can now do damage!]
Unload 6 second cool-down. Increase damage by 150%.) [It does less damage then sword autoattack…]
Headshot – 8 second cool-down (Increase damage by 350%.) [Seriously, it does 84 base damage…)
Black Powder -10 Second cool-down. (Increase damage by 250%.) [Seriously, it does 84 base damage…)
Sneak Attack – Increase base damage and bleed duration damage by 50%.)

Daggers:
Double Strike/Chain – No cool-down. (Increase Poison Duration by 25%.)
Heartseeker – 2 second cool-down. (No Damage Change, its fine.)
Death Blossom -* 6 second cool-down*. (Increase power (not bleed.) damage by 250%.)
Dancing Dagger -* 8 second cool-down.* (Increase damage by 120%)
Cloak And Dagger -10 second cool-down. (Increase damage by 50%.)
Backstab – Damage is fine, however make it to where it stuns the target if you hit them from the back instead of doing more damage, front/back damage should be the same.

Forget cooldowns.

And about unload doing 150% more damage…. have you gone mad ? i mean rly… It now does 6k or so damage on glass cannon if it hits whole and you are speced as glass too.

It would do 15k on glass cannons w/o stacks of might blodlust stacks and stuff. With all that could be 20k damage from 1 skill… a ranged non rooting Hundred blades.

Yeah right…

UNLOAD DOES 4k Damage against bunkers and is a slow channal, very easy to avoid. – And costs “5”, FIVE initiative. (because it fires 8 times for 199 damage, this means if the enemy has toughness/protection it contests against every shot and makes each shot do very little.

My Sword Autoattack Chain does 6500 damage if I hit with it, and Unload does not even give the thief evasion.

Unload is very slow and channals and snares the thief, and offers no evasion and is easilly dodged, you also can’t run away while you use it because if you turn around it cancels unload.

It does 199 on paper. When might stacks + dmg traits, critical rate + critical damage comes to mind each hit goes around 350 damage-750+ critical on power precision.(Average hit does 600 if i take 50% critical rate(runes of divinity). and 62% crit damage)

600 hiting 8 times does basicly 5k damage, on Spvp not minding WvW where stats can be much highter. And thats if you take runes of divinity not the best damage runes.

5k*(100% +150% that you propose) is 12500 damage… Withouth might stacks, fury, stacks of Bloodlust.
You can haste it to cast it in 1.5 seconds. You want ranged Hundred blades equivalent skill. Which thiefs thanks to innitiative mechanic(which is well though) could spam and you want support ?

In WvW doing 20k with best gear foods with 114% crit dmg and so on. Oh 1 skill 1 dead , lets cast it on another now.

This was all if you added cool-downs to thief skills like the topic said:

Hundred Blades roots you and is an AOE attack, has 6 second cooldown if traited for it, and grants might on each critical hit, and has a very high chance (80-90%) to critical due to many traits warrior has, the warrior also has heavy armor.

Unload snares you for 50% and is NOT an aoe attack, would have an 8 second cool-down and a much lower chance to critical (60%.), the thief also has medium armor and pistol/pistol thief has little to no access to stealth.
Both attacks break channel if you try to move around too much.

Unload has 900 range, but is not an AOE attack, and the user has less armor and almost no stealth, because you pretty much need traits like (25% movement speed and Shadow-Step.) You also pretty much need +90 Precision Signet so it criticals.

Your also ignoring the other things greatsword offers, the spin move is an aoe attack that offers movement breaks and allows you to move quickly, warriors also have perma swiftness with traits and SoR, which also gives them base fury, Thieves have little to no access to fury.

Daecollo.9578:

Stin.9781:

Daecollo.9578:

Stin.9781:

Daecollo.9578:

Revamp all traits to be useful.

Pistols:
Vital Shot – No cool-down (Double Firing Rate.) [It can now do damage!]
Unload 6 second cool-down. Increase damage by 150%.) [It does less damage then sword autoattack…]
Headshot – 8 second cool-down (Increase damage by 350%.) [Seriously, it does 84 base damage…)
Black Powder -10 Second cool-down. (Increase damage by 250%.) [Seriously, it does 84 base damage…)
Sneak Attack – Increase base damage and bleed duration damage by 50%.)

Daggers:
Double Strike/Chain – No cool-down. (Increase Poison Duration by 25%.)
Heartseeker – 2 second cool-down. (No Damage Change, its fine.)
Death Blossom -* 6 second cool-down*. (Increase power (not bleed.) damage by 250%.)
Dancing Dagger -* 8 second cool-down.* (Increase damage by 120%)
Cloak And Dagger -10 second cool-down. (Increase damage by 50%.)
Backstab – Damage is fine, however make it to where it stuns the target if you hit them from the back instead of doing more damage, front/back damage should be the same.

Forget cooldowns.

And about unload doing 150% more damage…. have you gone mad ? i mean rly… It now does 6k or so damage on glass cannon if it hits whole and you are speced as glass too.

It would do 15k on glass cannons w/o stacks of might blodlust stacks and stuff. With all that could be 20k damage from 1 skill… a ranged non rooting Hundred blades.

Yeah right…

UNLOAD DOES 4k Damage against bunkers and is a slow channal, very easy to avoid. – And costs “5”, FIVE initiative. (because it fires 8 times for 199 damage, this means if the enemy has toughness/protection it contests against every shot and makes each shot do very little.

My Sword Autoattack Chain does 6500 damage if I hit with it, and Unload does not even give the thief evasion.

Unload is very slow and channals and snares the thief, and offers no evasion and is easilly dodged, you also can’t run away while you use it because if you turn around it cancels unload.

It does 199 on paper. When might stacks + dmg traits, critical rate + critical damage comes to mind each hit goes around 350 damage-750+ critical on power precision.(Average hit does 600 if i take 50% critical rate(runes of divinity). and 62% crit damage)

600 hiting 8 times does basicly 5k damage, on Spvp not minding WvW where stats can be much highter. And thats if you take runes of divinity not the best damage runes.

5k*(100% +150% that you propose) is 12500 damage… Withouth might stacks, fury, stacks of Bloodlust.
You can haste it to cast it in 1.5 seconds. You want ranged Hundred blades equivalent skill. Which thiefs thanks to innitiative mechanic(which is well though) could spam and you want support ?

In WvW doing 20k with best gear foods with 114% crit dmg and so on. Oh 1 skill 1 dead , lets cast it on another now.

This was all if you added cool-downs to thief skills like the topic said:

Hundred Blades roots you and is an AOE attack, has 6 second cooldown if traited for it, and grants might on each critical hit, and has a very high chance (80-90%) to critical due to many traits warrior has, the warrior also has heavy armor.

Unload snares you for 50% and is NOT an aoe attack, would have an 8 second cool-down and a much lower chance to critical (60%.), the thief also has medium armor and pistol/pistol thief has little to no access to stealth.
Both attacks break channel if you try to move around too much.

Unload has 900 range, but is not an AOE attack, and the user has less armor and almost no stealth, because you pretty much need traits like (25% movement speed and Shadow-Step.) You also pretty much need +90 Precision Signet so it criticalse
Your also ignoring the other things greatsword offers, the spin move is an aoe attack that offers movement breaks and allows you to move quickly, warriors also have perma swiftness with traits and SoR, which also gives them base fury, Thieves have little to no access to fury.

There WONT be cooldowns on thief weapeons unless class is tottaly remade.
If you do have a suggestion that does not include cooldowns say it, if not keep it to yourself.

Daecollo.9578:

Unload snares you for 50%…..

Well, I´m yet to experience this, where did you got this conclusion?
I´m fully mobile while channeling Unload, with the exception of dodge, that will of course interrupt it…..

STRanger.5120:

Daecollo.9578:

Unload snares you for 50%…..

Well, I´m yet to experience this, where did you got this conclusion?
I´m fully mobile while channeling Unload, with the exception of dodge, that will of course interrupt it…..

Maybe he is always walking backwards when casting unload.

Aegael.6938:

Thanks for clearly not reading the entire thing before responding. I never made any mention of changing thief skills to a cooldown system.

You also have the opposite. Thief is the class that can spam the 5 skill the MOST out of any other class. Even if you swap weapons, that skill is typically on a 25+ second cooldown, much longer than a single weapon swap. For a thief, he just needs to wait a few seconds for 5-6 initiative, then he can use his skill again.

I’m ticking this in the category of “Senseless kneejerk reaction.”

That’s kind of where you’re wrong, when another class swaps weapons, sure they have all their skills off CD. If a thief swaps weapons at 0 initiative tho, he doesn’t have all of his skills available for “spamming”, he has to wait for that initiative to regen. And he needs to wait a bit longer than “a few seconds” for 6 initiative, it regens 1 point every 1.67 seconds. That’s effectively giving a 10 second CD to EVERY 6 initiative skill once a thief burns their initiative.

Any other class can burn all the CDs on a weapon and switch w/o giving it a second thought, having access to 5 new skills, not saying anyone does that(also not saying nobody does that, because some people obviously do), but the thief doesn’t have that luxury. They have to manage their initiative.