As said already, sword/pistol makes a great combination, with aoe damage and shadowsteps from the sword mainhand, and control from the pistol offhand, it’s great for solo leveling out in the world. I’ve also found dagger/dagger with high dps gear to be amazing for leveling, the damage output is insanely high, and you dont need survability or control if you kill an enemy before it even knows you’re there. Cloak and dagger into a from-behind backstab, and if they aren’t dead yet, a quick heartseeker or two finishes them off. Thief is a very fun class to play, with a lot of focus on positioning and mobility, and all sorts of fun traits to back that playstyle up. While we’re somewhat limited in actual weapon options, we can mix and match mainhand/offhands for more options, and every combination of weapons works together, is viable (depending on how you want to play), and is fun.
Leveling my thief went very quickly, as not only do we have massive burst damage, we also get a permanent 25% speed boost to help running around everywhere, and shadowsteps for mobility to get on mobs even quicker. As a leveling build, I’d suggest going pure dps gear, with D/D main weapon set and either S/P or shortbow offset; D/D for the massive single target damage, and shortbow or S/P for fighting multiple foes. Traits, I’d suggest maxing critical strikes whenever possible (it gives strong damage and has some very attractive traits), and then putting other points into shadow arts to 10 for perma regen (if you want to be more of an in-your-face player), OR vitality to 15 for spamming dodges (if you want to be a can’t-touch-this player), and then other points into deadly arts for even more damage. As a thief, your main defense comes from killing things before they can kill you, and augmented by smart use of dodging.
