Guild Wars 2

Hi there,

Some of you might know me from my warrior Matale; I played him since BWE1 and released 7 PvP videos. After my last video I felt that it was about as good as it was ever going to get on my warrior and that a Mesmer or Thief would fit my solo play style much better and I ended up picking a thief. Bellow you can see my first montage as a condition thief dagger/dagger – short bow in WvWvW called Sohpital 1.

I’ll try and explain a little bit my choices for gear, skills, traits and play style to try and answer any questions some people might have.

First I’ll start with the play style. Basically what you’re aiming for is to apply bleeds when you have initiative or on weapon swaps and then pretty much wait for your opponent to die while you stealth or kite him. The damage you do outside bleeds is bellow average so going head to head with someone would just result in a loosing battle.

Gear wise I picked full carrion stats which are condition damage, power and vitality. I didn’t feel comfortable with a low HP so condition damage and vitality were my 2 main stats. I would have liked to switch power to precision and pick up Sigil of Earth (apply bleeds on critical) but I don’t think a gear set with those stats exists.

For sigils I went with Geomancy (apply bleeds on weapon swap) for one of my daggers and short bow and Corruption (+10 condition damage on kill) for my other dagger. I would have liked to use other sigils instead of Corruption however all the other good ones such as Sigil of Doom (apply poison) shared CDs with Geomancy meaning they just didn’t work.

As far as runes go, I went full runes of Undead. I don’t care that much about condition duration because any decent player is going to have a couple of condition removals so I doubt my bleeds will tick for longer than 10 seconds. I found it more important to increase bleed damage.

Because I’m playing a condition thief and fights tend to take a little longer especially versus opponents with condition removal, I considered that it was really important to get both self healing traits Shadow’s Rejuvenation and Assassin’s Reward. This way I’m constantly healing while fighting and while hiding in stealth. You’ll often see in the video situations where I barely survive a burst combo but then I’m able to quickly recover, bring my health back up and even win. Shadow’s Embrace I found to be absolutely vital to my build as I’m often in stealth and my condition removal isn’t exactly top notch. Infusion of Shadow is also one of my better traits because it practically makes my Cloak and Dagger cost nothing if I stay in stealth for the full duration and it makes Shadow Refuge act like a battery and charge up my initiative by 2 every time it pulsates. I’ve debated a little bit between Fleet Shadow, Vigorous Recovery and Power of Inertia but I ended up picking Fleet Shadow because it helped me stick to my target without using initiative and at the same time it was great for when I had to escape. Thrill Of The Crime was the only option I really liked for the first trait in Trickery as the swiftness you gain is great for catching your opponents and for escaping. Bountiful Theft is another great trait. There are many cases when this trait is useful however my favorite is after a warrior uses his elite skill, Signet of Rage

For my utility skills I just picked the ones that gave me stealth, Blinding Powder and Shadow Refuge and Shadowstep which is perfect for breaking stun or enemy burst combos and also to catch enemies that are running away. I usually use Blinding Powder and Shadow Refuge during burst moments as at that point I prefer to use all my initiative on doing damage instead of Cloak and Dagger. Shadow Refuge with Infusion of Shadow also replenishes a lot of my initiative as explained above so I can immediately come back and apply more pressure.

As far as strategies go, you can see them in my video. I generally like to open with my short bow and try and apply Choking Gas while dodging their opener. Many players like to start strong with their hardest hitting ability and while I apply my poison I watch out for those and do my best to dodge them. Meanwhile I try and get in melee range with them and swap to my daggers close enough so they get the 3 bleeds from my sigil. I try and Death Blossom usually once and then go in stealth, trying to force a condition removal ability. There’s no point in dumping all of your initiative unless you know they have no way of removing your bleeds and poison so I found that starting slowly is a much better approach. Obviously, you can’t really do that all the time since many situations require different tactics however that’s my general rule. I am interested in playing this build with a pistol/dagger instead of my short bow as in theory I think it could be better, more bleed stacks so more damage.

The only thing I don’t like about this build is that I can’t seem to implement Heartseeker and Cluster Bombs into it. Heartseeker just barely does any damage (usually around 1-1.5k) and the only times I use it is if I need to catch someone or my target only has around 2-3k HP and I can use it a few times to finish them off. I would really like to see this ability become more viable and one suggestion I had was that maybe each Death Blossom could increase the amount of damage my next Heartseeker does by a certain percentage so that after 5 Death Blossoms or more it would be a good idea to use Heartseeker. Cluster Bombs is even worse. Choking Gas which lands much faster and has a bigger radius is pretty difficult to land versus a decent player. Cluster Bombs is close to impossible even vs the worst players because everyone knows to get out of red circles. I can’t detonate them in melee range either because they land really fast. My only regret is that I wish I could use these two abilities more often for a more diverse and interesting combat system.

Thanks for watching and I hope you enjoyed the video!

now this is wat gives me hope cuz right now im lvling my newly made thief that video was epic especially in the first part where u pretty ,much 3v1 that group while staying in melee range epic xD

So what is the build?

I saw a 5/0/30/30/5 build that seemed similar, but am curious exactly what you are using.

Fourth.5603:

So what is the build?

I saw a 5/0/30/30/5 build that seemed similar, but am curious exactly what you are using.

whatch the last few seconds of the video please

i run a 0/0/20/20/30 on my thief its working out pretty great with undead runes and carrion amulet for spvp pretty freakin funny how i almost never get killed tho i kno sum ppl are like GOD why isnt she dead already :P

Thanks for the video…. I am currently running a condition build, and am in the process of crafting my exotics. I still tend to die fairly quick, but seeing how you spec and play (which is very similar to me) I can get an idea how “durable” and how well conditions will tick once I am finally geared.

Great video by the way, shows how deadly thieves can be, without a gimmicky backstab build.

Mwari.8016:

Thanks for the video…. I am currently running a condition build, and am in the process of crafting my exotics. I still tend to die fairly quick, but seeing how you spec and play (which is very similar to me) I can get an idea how “durable” and how well conditions will tick once I am finally geared.

Great video by the way, shows how deadly thieves can be, without a gimmicky backstab build.

Glad you enjoyed it! You just really need to watch your opponent and avoid his burst combos and with this build you definitely have plenty of ways to escape and recover.

Really nice video I’m glad to see more condition Thieves out there amid all this backstab-5k shaman-bullcrap. My only suggestion is to put your build/gear info at the beginning of the video. Great music choices too.

Fantastic video! So nice to see a different combat style that is still effective. Gives me hope that despite any crying and nerfs the thief will still be viable.

Somebody should by now post a video from the “other side” as well. Or maybe a split screen. To show how much effect the delayed rendering has.

It is very frustrating to encounter any of the C’n’D spamming builds in WvWvW. In reality to the other players you are not stealth for 3 or 4s as seen from your POV, you remain not rendered for quite a bit longer.

Until this is fixed, evaluating the performance of this build is kinda pointless.

When Did I made This Post? hehe ..sounds just like me.Nicely done.I always said that BS thieves are not the one they should actualy worry about .

I can’t detonate them in melee range either because they land really fast

By the way..there is an option in game to ‘’Fast-Cast ground targeting’’ skills.Its faster and I find it so much more effective.That way you’ll be able to detonate in melee range.