Guild Wars 2

Had a break for many months so i am not up to speed on my Warrior as i used to be, bare this in mind

Joined a 1v1 server and met a Thief that kinda ….well he facerolled me. I had no chance whatsoever to get him in melee. His spec was a sword dagger with a bow. My spec was greatsword with a dual sword which i use as a gap closer. But since the animations on warriors are so obvious and straightforward he just dodged away from every gap closer ability i had. Rush and bladetrail he avoided, switched to dual swords and used savage leap which he also avoided.

So basicly i ended up running after him trying to hit while he used his bow to keep distance on me, then he ported on me and used the flanking and larcenous strike on me and then dodging away.

I felt like a puppet running around not what to do. Maybe im a terrible warrior right now, which i probably am. But i cant figure out a solution to this kind of a Thief. He was toying with me. The only thing i can think of that i have not tested is a Axe build, but yeah. Any tips ? I read that so many are having difficulties with Thief. At launch Thiefs were the easiest to deal with, now its opposite. I read on Thief forums that warriors are the easiest for them. Like WTF

I already have another thread about this: thief dmg.. realy..

But a short answear.
I doesnt realy matter how you play your warrior against thieves these days.
If the thief is moderately good. you stand no chanse.

Most thief spec’s are troublesome indeed, I’ve dueled a fair amount of them and its true that the matchup is very unfavorable, the s/d set is really annoying because they will likely have an available stunbreaker on the shadow return from their sword or their shadowstep utility so its hard to keep them in place and they evade from their #3 a lot so getting damage in is really challenging.

Also, 2 sword setup isn’t particularly strong, Savage leap is useful but offhand sword is meh. Assuming he dodges the obvious attacks like savage leap, rush, bladetrail etc, all you’ve got left is Whirlwind and autoattacks and you’re probably not going to bring him down with those two.

The most broken build is the one using sword/dagger. The shadowstep breaks out of any stun combo and any immobilize with zero cool down and is instant.

I suggest you roll a thief or mesmer as you will achieve more with less than half the effort you put in your warrior.

Imo, the best way to deal with thief; Hammer or Rifle. Both dmg specced. When second one is kinda obvious (you won’t hit with KS ofc, but it’s still counter for S/D happy jumping since you hit them anyway), hammer works great as a main burst weapon. Most of players are scared of your GS/Evi, but if you suddenly switch into a hammer with some kind of haste + talents like Merciless Hammer, Unsuspecting etc you can easily take down squishy target in 3 hits (hammer hits with berserker oriented build are kinda…insane, 4-5k per hit is normal even with horribly reduced crit damage in spvp). However, good S/D thief has the advantage in tpvp and it’s all about luck & timing your CCs between his stun breaks.

actually its very easy!
i dont know why so many people think thief is one of the hardest enemies for warriro while it is the easiest in my opinion!!! (at least with the build i use in spvp)

I use Axe/Shield + Hammer
traits 0-0-30-30-10
spvp Berzerker Amulett because we have definitly enough defense with that build

4x CC with short cooldowns (traited skill recharge time for hammer and shield)

even if s/d thief has stunbreaker then he may escape but it gives him 0 real advantage because he deals 0 damage while running away and as soon as he comes back he will be stunned/knocked down/knocked back again… so maybe he escapes but he just cant kill you and cant win in 90% of fights

only build that can be annoying is pistol offhand skill 5 which can cause a lot of blindness

I use shout warrior (also fully traited ofc)

if you stay in the smoke field then you have noch chance of dealing damage or landing your burst properly but with condition remove in the right second you can knock him out of the field or land your burst and my build is rather defensive for a warrior so if the thief doesnt play offensive it will be very hard for him to kill me….

in 90% of cases i either win vs a thief in spvp or it is sudden death (most times because the thief runs away when noticing he cant stand against the CC)

this build is Number 1 build for hotjoin spvp in my opinion

you have good heal + good condition remove + a lot of burst (adrenaline is built up super super fast) and the big amount of CC gives 2 more big advantages:
1) the enemy deals less damage while stunned/knocked down/…
2) it is way easier to hit the enemy and land your bursts more often

in general this build is very good versus thieves/other warriors/rangers/daggerdagger-eles (ddeles dont bring you down at least… 80% of fights vs dd-ele you either you win with this build or it is a sudden death but you dont lose too often in 1vs1 with this build…. scepter/dagger can be hard though)
guardians also dont bring you down normally (if you manage to hit with your CC then they dont deal too much damage and you have a chance of taking them down… it is important to care for their blindness from greatsword and sword and for their block ofc… but if you can land your CC and bursts then you have quite a good chance of winning)

good necros can be very hard ofc (condition remove with the 3 shouts is not bad and you can get rid of chill/criple/fear to land your burst but a good necro wont let you come close and even if you come close enough he can still dodge :/ …doesnt mean you cant win versus necro but it can be a tough one)

mesmers can be easy and can be hard depens on their build and how good you know the mesmer skills (so you arent confused by clones/invisibility and you know when to dodge their shatter burst)
…but i have to admit that with the right build and experience a mesmer is just superior to warrior in 1 vs 1

Engineers are another class that can be very annoying for warrior
they have the best CC of all classes…* its a mix of skill and luck which one of you lands its CC first on the other one* (or better: a chain of CC … you have 4x CC skills so you can lock enemies for quite some time if they dont have enough stun breakers!)
i think it really depends on the engineers skill levels but if engineer is experienced in spvp it wont be an easy fight!

Great advice, Orangen. You can use reckless dodge to remove blind if you got it and you really have to, I guess.

I can put up with many broken thief mechanics but I don’t like them getting away whenever they want. I slot stuff just to try and minimize them getting away.

In other words:

S/d thief is a 1v1 build. To kill him you need another 1v1 build. Like hammer + x.

I use Hammer + Mace/shield + Soldier Amulet. I just keep spamming stuns until people die. But you are not so useful in group fights.

Or at least, you can die easily, also because you put pressure only to one enemy at a time.

care to post a video of you guys beating a non garbage thief?

AlBundy.7851:

care to post a video of you guys beating a non garbage thief?

Curse you and your reality check!

I don’t know if you can beat them. I just came up with the most 1v1 oriented build I can think about. I killed some thieves, but I don’t know whether they were garbage or not.

The idea is: if we can’t win with it, we can’t win with anything.

redslion.9675:

I don’t know if you can beat them. I just came up with the most 1v1 oriented build I can think about. I killed some thieves, but I don’t know whether they were garbage or not.

The idea is: if we can’t win with it, we can’t win with anything.

Here is how to tell a garbage thief from one who knows how to abuse his broken mechanics -I never call players being carried by their class good-:

You can’t kill them..they just run off to reset the fight repeatedly trying to see if you will kitten up and blowing your cool downs. If you don’t -because you are a better player doing this on the worst class in spvp in the game-, they run off.

eldain stenlund.4306:

I already have another thread about this: thief dmg.. realy..

But a short answear.
I doesnt realy matter how you play your warrior against thieves these days.
If the thief is moderately good. you stand no chanse.

seriously i killed lots of thieves with a warrior

it really depends on the build.

loseridoit.2756:

eldain stenlund.4306:

I already have another thread about this: thief dmg.. realy..

But a short answear.
I doesnt realy matter how you play your warrior against thieves these days.
If the thief is moderately good. you stand no chanse.

seriously i killed lots of thieves with a warrior

it really depends on the build.

you mean it depends on if the thief is good or bad…

if its a good thief.. he will toy with you.. no matter how good you are.

eldain stenlund.4306:

loseridoit.2756:

eldain stenlund.4306:

I already have another thread about this: thief dmg.. realy..

But a short answear.
I doesnt realy matter how you play your warrior against thieves these days.
If the thief is moderately good. you stand no chanse.

seriously i killed lots of thieves with a warrior

it really depends on the build.

you mean it depends on if the thief is good or bad…

if its a good thief.. he will toy with you.. no matter how good you are.

no. i draw

i use a warhorn build that is pretty tanky and crits very well. I usually creep out most thieves with one crit.

It also depends on the thief’s build.

d/d thieves are not so immortal.

You need CCs bro, not gap closers. what you think you can keep out with a thief without CCs as a warrior?..and why would you bring dual sword and GS…seems like a terrible weapon combo tbh.

That’s actually one of the better weapon combos since this last patch. Warrior CCs are garbage especially against a decent thief.

AlBundy.7851:

That’s actually one of the better weapon combos since this last patch. Warrior CCs are garbage especially against a decent thief.

Please tell how the last patch effects this weapon combo.

What, Warriors CCs are garbage? ok?still better then warriors gap closing skills lol.
oh by CC, i also meant immobilize btw, maybe not the same category.

Ever heard of Larcenous strike?

AlBundy.7851:

Ever heard of Larcenous strike?

You ever heard of Dodge Roll? or being optimistic for once lol.

AlBundy.7851:

That’s actually one of the better weapon combos since this last patch. Warrior CCs are garbage especially against a decent thief.

You are right. They are garbage. They are just the best in the game single target.

Is this Engie invade the warrior forums day or something?

Well, you can’t stunlock the enemy as an engineer.

Think about me as a warrior.

lol did a hammer warrior touch you in a naughty place? Was your dodge button sticky?

I was the hammer warrior.

And I have done things you couldn’t even imagine with other people’s lives using that.XD

And if you are doing things right, dodging won’t be an issue.

I bet stability and dodge rolls mean nothing to you

Have you EVER heard of immobilize?

Trust me, with some exercise you can make that baby work well. But IMHO you need Berserker’s stance. And leg specialist.

I can’t stop laughing. Every time you mention Zerker’s Stance. It’s way too slow if combat was slower maybe but just lol not even mentioning adrenaline decay if your not in comabt when you pop it.

I mean touting leg specialist too lol if leg specialist actually added it’s effect onto a current immobilize instead of bugging out and turning a longer immob on a target into the 1 second leg specialist immob I could read your post without laughing.

Actually, adrenaline decay is a bit odd. It doesn’t always work. Sometimes I can enter combat with a full bar.

And I feel otherwise adrenaline filling would be too slow. And you are the one slowing down your opponent. Try it, it works well.

Paper-Rock-Scissors

Mesmers beats Thieves, Thieves beats Warrior, and Warrior…um…you get the idea.

One warrior build that I hated was a Mace+Shield / Hammer….never tasted dirt that much before. I still beat him but it was humiliating.

[EDIT for clarity]

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Paper-Rock-Scissors

Mesmers beats Thieves, Thieves beats Warrior, and Warrior…um…you get the idea.

One warrior build that I hated was a Mace+Shield / Hammer….never tasted dirt that much before. I still beat him but it was humiliating.

[EDIT for clarity]

thieves beat warriors… …
you know you have this whole Paper-Rock-Scissors wrong ?

its: Boromir kills Gollum… Gollum kills Gandalf… Gandalf kills Boromir.
Heavy kills leather… leather kills light… light kills heavy.

lightning bolt on metal… bzzzzzz fun stuff.

eldain stenlund.4306:

lightning bolt on metal… bzzzzzz fun stuff.

Ever heard about Faraday’s cage?XD

You could end up suffering less damage, because all the charges pass on the armor, creating an electric field of 0 for the wearer. That’s the same reason why staying in a car is safer than walking during a storm.

s/d thief I generally run away and hit him with whirlwind and eviscerate (I time it off of his sound fx) and hope that he kittens off. CC is the worst suggestion you could offer, seeing as s/d is immune to pretty much all types of crowd control. Longbow can also work here, partly due to the WTF factor and a lot of thieves not understanding longbow. Rifle isn’t an option I’ve tested a lot here, but I think it would actually also work… though bringing an otherwise pretty useless weapon set for one class seems like a poor choice to me.

d/p a hammer is a terrrible choice due to the blinds unless maybe if packing an axe (hammer+axe/x=you will be kited to death by anything ranged however). Generally I find longbow/gs to be the most effective choice here, AoE him down low enough then whirlwind him.

As to this “have you ever heard of dodge” crap, as a warrior you don’t get a lot of these. Use them wisely.

I must have fought only bad thieves then, or only d/d. Yeah, I agree I’d have no way to stop a thief spamming black powder.

And to fight other ones, I have to use things like Bull Rush into point blank range, hoping it works properly as an instant knockdown. Then chain them. Hoping they won’t teleporting away. And I try to outlast them in terms of survivability.

Seeing how s/d goes, seems actually hard to stop them. I saw one streaming. He used infiltrator’s strice before a fight and then teleported away when low on Initiative, to buy enough time to refill it.

I don’t agree.

I’m using the knights armor with Divinity runes.
Main weapon: Hammer second: sword + warhorn

I’m fighting lots thiefs in WvW, no problem to bust a thief. 9/10 times i’m winning this battle.
Whenever you use ur hammer, u have to bash the thief with F1 followed followed by 5 —> 4 —> 3 —> F1 —> sword and the thief is dead

In sPvP you are a bit troubled vs a good thief because you can’t really build the kind of warrior that can tank while dealing enough dmg to put them out.

In WvW you can create a warrior that has the type of dmg and tankiness that the warrior class should have. Thieves shouldn’t be much of a problem. Even good thieves will have problems dealing with a WvW warri, mainly because they can’t burst him out while being fly swatted with 1 or 2 shots if they hang in for too long.

Tyrael.2769:

I don’t agree.

I’m using the knights armor with Divinity runes.
Main weapon: Hammer second: sword + warhorn

I’m fighting lots thiefs in WvW, no problem to bust a thief. 9/10 times i’m winning this battle.
Whenever you use ur hammer, u have to bash the thief with F1 followed followed by 5 —> 4 --> 3 —> F1 --> sword and the thief is dead

One shadowstep from a swordthief -or even a smart non sword thief- will bypass any kind of cc or immobilize you use. They have it up on demand all the time with zero cool down.

The best you can hope for if you are good at what you do is them running away and denying you your badge. What they do is they will just reset the fight repeatedly till they blow your cool downs and get lucky with you missing a hit.