Guild Wars 2

still trying to figure out this profession, pretty much using d/p build from metabattle,

im confused because i really dont understand how this class survives, anything.

is it really the devs goal that i play this profession with the intention of not really
playing?

i get the idea behind rotating points, and +1 support, but its pretty ineffective in any sort of combat outside of ranged and the random snipe here and there.

im pretty much dead just by being spotted.

i dunno, please share your experience or whatever.

1) Right now, thief is in a bad spot for direct combat. Its possible, but we always will have a hard time.

2)The d/p metabattle build is especially bad at direct combat, it really just focusses on the +1 aspect. Go with staff, DD or even SD if you want to fight.

3) A big part of your sustainability comes from good movement and good positioning. It is something you just have to figure out yourself, it can not be taught.
Basically: you move in to attack, deal enough damage to kill any wounded foe or at least make them panic, but you never stay in a place where they can attack you. Being too agressive on a thief is a beginners mistake, as well as being not agressive enough. If you can keep up the pressure, a lot of enemies will be forced in the defense.

4) You heavily rely on evading the enemies key/burst skills. You have a couple of dodges in each fight, but you have to know exactly, what skill to use them on.
You have to read you opponent basically. New players are usually very focused to get their own skils right, leaving them little time to watch the enemy.

5) The metabattle build is not exactly friendly to beginners, since it is very unforgiving.

6) Dont be kitteno (srsly now? This is so not a kitten word!)swap to your shortbow. This is what you will see most streamers doing, what casual thieves do not: swapping to their shortbow midfight.

7) Classes you should have a chance against: Rev (not rly on dp), Necro, Warrior, Mesmer, the others you should avoid, unless a teammate backs you up. Or better yet: you back up a teammate.

8) I recommend escapists absolution over impacting disruption. Headshot is a a-hard-to-hit skill that requires some training, you have enough to worry about, the extra condi cleanse should really help you with survival.

9) I recommend this build if you want something with better sustain and better direct combat capabilities. Its very close to what im running right now, and It should be very playable for a beginner, once you figured out, what staff skill to use in what situation. In the beginning you should be fine with well used vaults.
If you want some serious sustain, stay on a point, 2v1 skip, fight against bunkers forever, I recommend sage or carrion d/d condi thief.

Frankly, thief has pretty steep learning curve, you really have to adopt a different playstyle than what you’re used to. Personally, I always try stay mobile, darting in and out of combat, bursting enemies to death before they can react. Thief has amazing mobility and you need to utilize that, moving between points faster than anyone else.

With any other class, you can basically tumble head first into combat, but with thieves that kind of play is just foolish, and gets you killed in a blink. A dead thief is a useless thief.

Thieves used to be able to 1v1 fairly well and participate in team fights. Anets idea behind all nerfs in 3 years was: oh thieves are so mobile and do high single target dmg, they should be squishy and useless in 1v1. Then they threw any common sense and their own logic out of window and made revs.

You can make thief works in current meta but it requires a lot of experience ( you need to be by mile better player than anyone in the match, you also have to rely on your team to survive in team fights) and frankly not worth it if you got rev anyway.^The class is legitimately middle finger from Anet to every thief player out there.

this all makes sense, because i seem to contribute only outside of any kind of giant melee scrum with boat loads of aoe/condi and direct damage going on. when it comes to direct combat, i also seem to do much better poking enemies with short bow and only trying to melee against downed or soon to be downed players.

i dunno if i really enjoy this kind of support where your’e not really fighting, instead your’e more like a foil, forcing enemies away from points, distracting them, securing stomps, its not as much fun as say engineer or dh or ele.

i guess i needed some reassurance the combat function of this prof/build is as durable as a soap bubble.

Yes. you have to be able to enjoy this playstyle. Or, like some of us, force combat and live with disappointments (or just play unranked and rip noobs apart, thats what I do to not get frustrated) But of course there is always hope for the next balance patch. Statistically speaking it did not really pay out to get your hopes up in the past, but meta shift seems to be their favourite thing, soo…

Yeah well, what really got my hopes up was learning that Karl is responsible for the next wvw balance patch.

The learning curve for D/P can be a bit rough since your defense is so active. Blinds, evades, and teleports will allow you to escape just about any fight that’s going badly as long as you can recognize when this is happening quickly enough.

If you’re looking to get a feel for how to play this build well, I suggest watching some of the gameplay from Sindrenerr on his twitch channel: https://www.twitch.tv/sindrenerr (edit: or see other vids from him here: http://www.dailymotion.com/sindrener)

Ideally, you rotate to fights already in progress, drop in just enough damage to where your teammate will undoubtedly win the fight and then use your superior mobility to do the same somewhere else or decap.

Good thief gameplay is a lot like taking the normal tempo of most other classes gameplay and drastically speeding it up. It may look like a hyper kid with ADHD at first, but each rotation and decision to engage or disengage from a fight should be a calculated choice where the opportunity cost of each outcome is carefully weighed as efficiently as possible.