Guild Wars 2

First a little background:

I played WoW from vanilla, Rift, Aion, all of them. I’ve never been a great PvP player but I was pretty good with my rogue in WoW. I try every class in every game but I always come back to the same two styles: Stealth melee and Ranged. Thief and Ranger. Every time

So, I played GW2 from launch, quit, now I’m back. Got my Ranger to 80 and now am leveling my thief. I always come back to the thief in every game.

My problem is this; I’m not 19 years old with the twitch ability to manage 20 buttons at once anymore. As the games strive to be more challenging, I find myself discouraged by the sheer number of things you have to manage. Hell, SWTOR had 20 key maps at level 20. Yet, despite my desire to play a class that is easier, I can’t bring myself to play a big armored tank.

My question for the community is this: Is there a thief build that can be played effectivly in WvW that doesn’t include 4 different stealth buttons? Can a thief be played without being lightning fast with your fingers? Doesn’t have to be the best build, just capable of not being an embarassment.

So far, I like two weapons sets the best. D/D condition is fun but I see that no one uses DB anymore because BS is just better. I love D/P in PvE but I run with a glass cannon precision/power build. Signets that I never pop. I ShadowShot all over the place and melt mobs down but from what I’ve seen online this won’t work in PvP because we are dead without stealth. S/P is cool for the aoe slashing but I don’t like IS because you only use it once, then you have to wait on the cooldown before you can jump on a new target. It’s like molasses compared to D/P. Tried P/D a few times but can’t quite get the feel of it, again I suspect because you have to have 4 different stealth buttons.

I’m beginning to feel that, as much as I love the class, I’m gonna have to go back to my Ranger, which I hate because I hate weapon swap. I love thief because you don’t have to weapon swap. If I could play my Ranger with Longbow always “on” I’d probably be happy. I know that most players love the dual-weaponset thing but for me it’s just hard. Especially when a-net, in their infinite wisdom, decided to not match attack styles to the same button. Seriously, would it have killed them to put the “interrupt” skill on the same button, regardless of weapon (same for the “cripple” skill).

I suspect that my replies will all say, “Thief is a hard class and not for you” but I thought I would toss it out there first to see if anyone else feels the same.

Thanks!

Did you try P/P yet? It’s not the best weapon set for WvW but it’s easy to play and works fine in most cases.

If you like the weapons I’m sure people will be able to send a decent build.

Unfortunately, I would reach the same conclusion that you have reached as well. The thief requires a lot of skill management to become somewhere to be considered semi-effective. You will not need to use every weapon skill, especially on D/D where you can effectively play with 2 weapon skills (backstab/c&d), but you will need to know all classes and achieve an almost perfect sense of timing to avoid getting downed in one go. Either that, or you won’t do any real damage. You can make the thief more “friendly” through the use of Cavalier/Valkyrie and relying on Hidden Assassin for guaranteed critical, but is limited, predictable and still not quite survivable.

Unfortunately, I can’t recommend you go to the Ranger, either. While we are in almost the worst spot in terms of player-versus-player skill/effectiveness ratio, the Ranger is even worse. It melts pretty much the same way that we do, has a pet that can be considered useless, and does not even have proper access to stealth or a burst option. No, Longbow is not an effective weapon in this condition/tank meta, and no, the stealth nor damage can effectively burn through anything. The one thing that the Ranger does better, however, is build on conditions. A well played condition Ranger is truly scary and a sight to behold, while a well played condition Thief remains mediocre at best.

Good luck on your decision!

Thief classes in many games are designed to be ‘twitchy’ with a need for fast button pressing. I’m in the same situation as you and have a low spec graphic card that doesn’t help with spotting animations. You could try a build that uses more blinds as they are less twitchy, and that probably means using the trait giving blind on stealth.

Ignore this you answered in in OP, my bad.