Guild Wars 2

I HATE thieves.

I’ve recently come back to the game after reading about some changes to the warrior and I think the class is (very) slowly moving in the right direction. I feel confident against most classes, and if I happen to lose I shrug it off. There is one class that I just can’t [shake it off] when I get beat (which is nearly always) and it is the thief. The burst damage… OMG! I feel like I’m wearing no armour at all the way they can burst me down. Now if I happen to turn it around via skillful play normally it would be an “Ah hah!” moment with me standing victoriously over my adversary. Not so with the thief. They just stealth & hop away at their leisure, either bounding over the distant hills or coming back in to finish the job.

I have lost all desire to play the game after run ins with thieves in WVW on 3 seperate occasions. I keep getting tricked into coming back to the game with promising new patches and even enjoy myself until….. you guessed it – I run into Mr Thief. I’m utterly confused how Anet can allow such a class to exist – one that can gank with impunity and ruin peoples fun to the point they don’t want to log in. I can roll a thief but I don’t think thats the answer. Anyways, just on my way out for the 4th time. I’ll probably be back next patch and repeat this madness all over again

Thieves can be pretty annyoing and a good thief if he doesn’t make any mistakes will most of the time be able to get away from you if you don’t hit him with a lucky punch or something.
But most thieves aren’t really good and if their burst damage is so high,then they’re usually glascannons and an easy kill. Try using AoE damage with a long bow or GS whirlwind for example or use something that immobilizes or stuns them like mace/shield. Also being able to block and endure pain against their burst is really nice or just dodge it. If you see him go invisible count till 2 then dodge. Against thieves with a ranged weapon the skill to reflect projectiles while blocking works nice as well.
The best advice I can give you though is just to create a thief and test him a bit in PvP against golems for example so you can just find out what they’re able to do and how far they can go with their invisibility. You can damage them even though you can’t see them. It helps with every class to just get a feeling for what they can do.

It’s very hit and miss with Thieves. I can take them sometimes on my Warrior 1v1, but it requires hitting them with Pin Down or having some CDs up. It’s also about crits and lucky dodges when they’re invisible. Can you dodge that BS enough times until they go visible?

Now, in a 2v1 or 2v2… that’s a different story, the bugger just pops up, takes another second or two to load visually and unloads a good 15k damage into my rosy bum before I can even hit Shield Block.

IMHO, with thiefs, I find that stealth isn’t the issue, but the blind spam is. these days I do pretty well with Mace/shield + GS. Majority of the thiefs only run 1 stun breaker (shadow step). If you manage to bait it out, one stun and they’ll eat a full 100b, which will down even the tankiest thiefs.

Another fun tip is to guess where the thief is inside shadow refuge. Try to land skull crack while he is in refuge, you can tell if you landed it by your adrenaline going down. Immediately 100b and keep hitting as long as your auto attack chain keeps going.

As doc Phil said, the best way to learn to fight a thief is to make one and play it for a while. Play some PvP with it rather than trying it only against golems. This will give you an idea of how a thief will move to get behind you.

My usual issue with thieves isn’t necessarily stealth, but blinds. Blinds are kicking the crap outta me.

ALTHOUGH I have recently found out that a skill like Volley (Rifle) will track thieves even after they stealth. It’s pretty fun to start shooting only to have them go into stealth and then reappear a few seconds later downed.