Guild Wars 2

Feel free to add opinions and what not, but I just wanted to post what I was thinking as I tried to find builds (and none of them are anything short of "I kill you in 1 second, or you kill me at your leisure). I don’t mean to get all of these (because we won’t for one), but any mixture of this sounds like it’d be nice. To me a Thief should excel at nuking singular targets by preparing or picking a place to fight (which is why there will be more vulnerability applying things).

DAGGER~Balancing stat is Berserker.
Dagger auto- Cleave increased from 2 to 3.
Death Blossom- Reworked to “Rook takes Knight”.
“Rook takes Knight”- Cost 4 initiative: Blink behind target enemy or ally dealing moderate damage (about half of cnd) and applying immobilize for 3 seconds unless target already has immobilize. If target was already immobilized, you instead gain 1 second of evasion (basically dodging without dodging).
Dancing Dagger- damage increases by 5%, bounce increased by 1.
Cloak and Dagger- damage reduced by 5%, vulnerability application increased from 3 to 5, now applies blind.
Backstab- damage reduced by 10%. Always critically strikes from stealth.

PISTOL~Balancing stat is Rampager.
Fixed a bug when taking the ankle shots trait that caused two tooltips of sneak attack to show.
Vital Shot- Now pierces and applies 2 stacks of bleed instead of 1.
Body Shot- Removed the damage portion of this skill. Immobilize increased from 1 second to 2, vulnerability duration increased from 3 seconds to 5 seconds.
Unload- Cleaned up animation, added two more shots. Reduced cast time 1/2 second. Increased initiative cost by 1.
Blinding Powder- Blind field pulses increased from 3 to 4 (nerf revert) and field size increased from 120 to 180.
Shadow Strike- Shot damage reduced by 15%. Shadow strike now additionally applies two stacks of confusion.

Sword~Balancing stat is Marauder.
Sword auto cleave- Increased from 3 to 5 targets.
Infiltrators Strike- Return initiative cost removed. Engage initiative cost increased by 1. Return now breaks stun as well as removes condition and cast time for return has been removed.

Traits in next post.

Meant traits and utilities. Utilities is pretty quick though.

Utilities
Hide in shadows- Cast time reduced from 1 second to 1/2 second.
Signet of Malice- Cast time reduced from 1 1/4 second to 1 second.
Skelk Venom- Each venom application applies a stack of vulnerability.
Spider Venom- Each venom application applies a stack of vulnerability.
Skale Venom- Each venom application applies a stack of vulnerability.
Ice Drake Venom- Each venom application applies a stack of vulnerability.
Devourer Venom- Each venom application applies a stack of vulnerability.
Shadow Trap- Cooldown reduced from 45 seconds to 30.
Ambush- Cooldown reduced from 35 seconds to 30.
Signet of Agility- Clear all damaging conditions on yourself when activated. (New Active)
Blinding Powder- Cooldown reduced from 40 seconds to 30.
Shadow Refuge- Fixed a bug that caused players to become revealed if they left the circle while the skill was active.

Traits

Deadly Arts
Dagger Training- Now always applies poison.
Deadly Trapper- Also creates a charge system for traps. Traps can now last indefinitely and be placed 3 times before overriding the oldest trap.
Revealed Training- Reworked. Reduces revealed time by 1 second. Upon being revealed, target that caused reveal gains Weakness, 5 stacks of vulnerability, and cripple. Condition lengths are equal to length of revealed. (to counter the stealth counters, and also as a good way to continue an engage)

Critical Strikes
Ankle Shots- All pistol abilities now pierce, and can bounce to up to 2 additional targets. Enemies hit by pistol skills that do not have cripple are given cripple (2 seconds) if above 50% hp. Removed damage amplifier.
Hidden Killer- Reworked into “Brace for Impact”.
Brace for Impact- Abilities used from stealth now additionally apply 10 stacks of vulnerability to enemies hit for 3 seconds and grants thief Protection and Resistance for 3 seconds.

Shadow Arts
Resilience of Shadows- Merged Fleet Shadows into this Minor.
Shadow’s Embrace- Once again removes all conditions, prioritizing damaging conditions.

Acrobatics
Fleet Shadows- Reworked to old Might on Dodge trait.
Swindler’s Equilibrium- Removed requirement to be wielding a sword or spear.
Hard to Catch- Also creates a 1 second evasion frame. (other classes get so much more, seemed wrong not to add that)
Assassin’s Reward- Spending initiative also restores 1% endurance per initiative spent.

Trickery
Preparedness- Now baseline. Moved Lead Attacks here and moved Sleight of Hand to old Lead Attacks.
Lead Attacks- Merged the daze and damage from Sleight of Hand and this trait. Moved cdr to Sleight of Hand.
Sleight of Hand- Reduced cdr by 15%. That 15% is now baseline. Sleight of Hand replaced by Sneaky Interaction.
Quick Pockets- Reworked: Reduce weapon swap recharge by 3 seconds. Gain 1 initiative every 5 seconds.
Sly Fingers- Stolen items are now 20% more effective in the damage application. Boon and condition applying items are now 100% more effective (double the stacks, not the duration).

Don’t your hopes up. I loved the name " Rook takes Knight" and i do agree with the idea that we need a precide shadowstep like that. but again don’ t get your hopes you.

Rook takes Knight looks interesting, but also removes a big part of Thief’s Condition build.

A change to RtK for condi could be it hits 3 times? (the blink plus both daggeres, would be an easy animation) 3 hits means 3 instant venom applications? But I always figured the dagger/dagger set for versatility- backstab and auto for heavy damage, hs for execution, db (rtk) for defense while revealed, dancing dagger for a slow+great aoe damage, cnd for stealth+vuln. Should I post the RtK skill in General Discussion and beg anet to do it XD?

Could you explain to me what you mean by Balancing stat? You want the balancing stats of pistol to be Rampager. what happens if I get a Valkyrie pistol ?

Serious Thought.5394:

A change to RtK for condi could be it hits 3 times? (the blink plus both daggeres, would be an easy animation) 3 hits means 3 instant venom applications? But I always figured the dagger/dagger set for versatility- backstab and auto for heavy damage, hs for execution, db (rtk) for defense while revealed, dancing dagger for a slow+great aoe damage, cnd for stealth+vuln. Should I post the RtK skill in General Discussion and beg anet to do it XD?

the venoms alone aren’t enough for a decent condition build. realistically, Spider is the only good damaging condition venom, and it only has 6 charges on a 30s cooldown. that’s nowhere near enough for a CD build. if anything, applying venoms is the easiest bit. the conditions themselves are weak.

@Kocoff- Then you have a valkyrie pistol. Its like asking what happens when you pick Clerics into Warrior’s Greatsword. You have clerics.

@Gray- What would you think I should change on it? I personally thought it was handy, seeing as the intended condi weapon set is pistol/dagger. Dagger/dagger is more versatile/disable. Poison reduces heal and causes weakness, weakness reduces direct damage, vulnerability increases damage. Death blossom feels like it was tacked on, it really doesn’t fit imo. I just want it to be more helpful. A dash to a target that immobilizes, which is another form of disable, or creates evasion (theme, something d/d lacks because number 3 is not supposed to be there) seems right, and the dagger trait that applies poison on hits still works (see also my change to the traits). What would you change?

Personally i want Caithe’s weapon set (and utility skills) from the LS Season 2 episodes. That was a blast.

For some strange reason, Thief is lacking access to conditions that should be profession defining. At a glance:

[Bleed]
All Thief sources of Bleed are either insufficient or incentivized strangely. D/D #3 puts on a good amount of stacks, but the skill itself sucks and you have to give up doing non-Condition damage (i.e., the focus of the rest of the weapon set) to do it. Pistol #1 puts stacks on, but the amount is arguably subpar even WITH Superior Sigil of Earth and full condition damage. See other professions for a guideline on how to provide Bleed properly. Thieves should really be a lot better at this one…

[Torment]
The newest damaging Condition on the block and the biggest missed opportunity. Due to Thief’s focus on mobility, Torment should be our bread and butter. Instead, one weaponskill applies a solid amount but is stuck on a bad weaponset, and the only other source is from one of the bad (i.e., not Spider or Basilisk) Venoms. More Torment, please?

[Vulnerability]
This seems like another missed opportunity. We’re Thieves, we strike at vulnerable targets (and/or make them vulnerable), so why are we so bad at this? Watching Shiro Revenants reach 20-25 steady stacks of Vulnerability by autoattacking faster than a Thief can (very briefly) get it that high through spamming Pistol #2 and wasting ALL THEIR INITIATIVE makes this painfully obvious.

[Blind]
We have a solid amount of Blind, although still overrated in my opinion. Black Powder is used more for stomps and restealths than it is actually avoiding damage, leaving the other main source D/P #3. Our Blind access is okay, but could be better… or we could just get some actual survivability, which would work too.

[Poison]
In my opinion, the only damaging condition Thieves have good access to. Dagger #1, Shortbow #4, Spider Venom (the only remotely useful one), the Deadly Arts trait (which competes with Mug…). It does feel like that trait should be for all weapons instead of just Dagger, though.

There’s other stuff, but those are the ones that really jump out at me.

Weakness application as defense. More please!

Serious Thought.5394:

@Gray- What would you think I should change on it? I personally thought it was handy, seeing as the intended condi weapon set is pistol/dagger. Dagger/dagger is more versatile/disable. Poison reduces heal and causes weakness, weakness reduces direct damage, vulnerability increases damage. Death blossom feels like it was tacked on, it really doesn’t fit imo. I just want it to be more helpful. A dash to a target that immobilizes, which is another form of disable, or creates evasion (theme, something d/d lacks because number 3 is not supposed to be there) seems right, and the dagger trait that applies poison on hits still works (see also my change to the traits). What would you change?

I’d personally prefer a matching set for conditions, but hey ho.

honestly, none of the thief weapon sets are great for conditions. we get a fair amount of multiplier conditions (weakness, vulnerability, might) and a decent amount of control conditions (blind, immobilise, cripple), but no set gives us a viable number of damaging conditions (bleed, poison, torment, confuse) considering that we need serious stacking power on these in order to compare to burning, this feels like a flaw.

your changes are actually pretty good, but it does leave us without a fully viable condition set, and I think that’s something we could look at elsewhere.

I’m not too familiar with the condition set up of the thief weapons, I usually play on the lockdown or instagib power modes.

I was thinking of changing shortbow 4 to be a bit more dangerous, but I doubt it’d happen. Choking gas by design is supposed to be lethal, not annoying. I was going to have it rotate conditions (Chaos storm like mesmers) between constant poison+daze/torment/blind/confusion/bleed/burn. But it seemed too much. Also skale venom isn’t that bad imo, I used it on my builds for the vuln and I found after sneak attacking + pistol 2 I usually had melted someone.

Any ideas on how to improve them? I’d personally revamp the Deadly Arts to be a bit more deadly and power oriented, but again I don’t want to be hitting and swinging at big changes.
Want me to do for p/d like I did d/d?

could do. my personal issue is that even with the changes you’ve made, there’s still not a great deal of stacking.

• pistol basic does 2 bleeds for 4s, which won’t stack that high (I think 8 bleed max?)

• torment on the combo skill for 5s, but due to the relatively high initiative cost and the trouble of stabbing, shadowstepping away, and then running back again makes stacking difficult.

even with the traited poison brought up to 100%, the duration’s still not anywhere near where it needs to be to give thief the conditions needed to compete with other condition builds. as it is, none of the thief sets really allow for heavy stacking – and without burning, that really does cripple our condition potential

(and while skale venom isn’t bad, the fact is that the damaging portion can be pretty low (if they don’t move) and even then it’s the second best venom)

I just feel like thief doesn’t really have a condition set. Dagger/Dagger is power, Pistol/Pistol feels either power or utility based:

• Vital Shot is a bleed (not too stackable)
• Body Shot is a vuln (more utility than condition)
• Unload is pure damage
• Headshot is a daze – making it more utility than any specific kind of damage
• Black powder is much the same – more utility than damage.

Sword has no conditions at all, and shortbow is – as far as condition damage is concerned – a melee AoE weapon. (Choking Gas is passable. spamming detonate cluster is the only other option…)

It feels like at least one of the weapons really needs reworked to be a more condition-focused weapon. as it is now, I’m running D/D – using Death Blossom to stack bleed when I can, and then basic attack chains to provide poison (also spider and often skale venoms) which means I’m really only using heartseeker as a jump, I never use dancing dagger, and rarely have the initiative for cloak and dagger. even on the best condition setup I can find, I’m only using 40% of the weapon skills…
(also, I always thought Deadly Arts was supposed to be the condition tree, but I’m seeing raw-power builds taking it as a must. I’m just not sure where condition damage sits on the thief…)

That’s the whole problem it seems to me- almost the entire thief weapon set is power. Dagger/dagger is intended for diversified power (which is why the poison percentage made no sense because it forces you to run d/d and lose out on so much else), d/p is intended for safe damage, p/p is intended for utility power, p/d is your condition set (could be better), s/d is your evasion damage, s/p is your “please make this skill hit” damage, and shortbow is just raw utility.

Then for trait lines:
DA- is intended to have deny conditions (which Yolo swaggins made a comment that I don’t understand about) such as poison, weakness, immobilize as well as massive power from mug, executioner, and that 10% when someone has a condition.
CS- is your pure power line. Not much else to say, its why my build has reached record high backstabs of 14.7k to 23.1k.
SA- is your defense stealth line. Stay in stealth, get benefits. Get outclassed by mesmer, continue to be salty. I’d love to rework this whole line.
Acro- is your “skillful evasion” line that rewards you for not getting hit. The rewards aren’t exactly stellar, but they aren’t bad. Buffs in key places would make this line desirable- I made some, but I’m sure there are others.
Trickery- is your steal line. Not much to it, it does things like grants boons, steal boons, give conditions, and daze.

In all of this its really difficult to find a traitline and weapon set that compliment each other. What really needs to happen is a base amount of condition damage on a specific weaponset (p/d) and even then its pretty weak. You shouldn’t get pigeoned into d/d for poison (which is why I did poison on all dagger skills, so dancing had application heaven) but without running it you lose a lot of damage. Meanwhile, p/d is better as a power set. =/ Not much to really say. It’s why I stuck vulnerability (extra on skale, I forgot to typo fix that) on all the venoms- to turn weak conditions into much more lethal conditions. Vulnerability applies to condition damage and its a surprising amount of damage differential. The best thing would be for Bewildering ambush to apply 5 stacks of confusion and 3 stacks of burn (its a confusing ambush, we dunno what happened) and to increase p/d skill 3’s torment by 1 on the skill and see what happens from there with my other “all dagger skills apply poison”. It’d start working out pretty well since you are supposed to 100-0 not have sustained fights, or at least I assume so.

Hi,

I think venom should work a kind like signet. with a passive and an active.
Just an example :
Passive : apply poison (or chill or etc…) for X secs each third strike
Active : apply poison for X*2 secs every strike.

then it should be usable with any set.