Guild Wars 2

Terrible suggestions from the OP. Clueless in the extreme.

Thieves need a small survivability buff and a small damage nerf and they are fine.

sorrow.2364:

It doesn’t matter if you don’t spam mindlessly. Many people do it and succed, I’ve tried to do this and I succeded. If you want to play a thief in an higher level, that’s good, but don’t you feel frustrated knowing that people with half your skill performs just as good as you do (assuming you are good, of course)? That’s the point. You should learn your profession, know the traits, try builds, timing skills and than you should be effective. With thieves is not the case.

i could say the same when i face mesmers. for me thief is a pain in the a fighting a mesmer, while he just sit in his aoe with his illusions,stuns,chaos,conditions.

or watch thieves running after eles because his combo is 50% usefull against them.

but….game is still young, everyone still need to improve.

why is it that everybody is defending this “brainless monkey gameplay” thiefs provide currently?

nerfing dmg or buffing defense wont change that.

YES i played a thief myself and yes compared to other classes (even mesmer) thief gameplay is designed for braindead monkeys.

Thedenofsin.7340:

Pistol Whip does an incredible amount of damage. When hastened, they blow up players within 2 seconds, which is simply not enough time to react in a match. Given how frequently thieves can get their haste (every 30?ish seconds), it’s imbalaced in hot-join pvp.

This needs to be appropriately adjusted.

I think the developers need to look at why is it some players can somehow dodge pistol whip and some others cant seem to get it through their heads to avoid it.

I dont even use haste anymore unless Im trying to steal svanir or chief during tournaments. Its too risky to use in fights because I could lose all my endurance and still end up not killing the person I was trying to kill.

Though in random browser matches when I was a newer player I found it very fun to pistol whip spam noobs with haste. Though now I have found the same noobs I can spam with haste I can spam without haste because every time I pistol whip I know they will let me do it again and again.

pistol whip is a counter. Its not even a decent stun its a good interrupt followed by a flurry of attacks that mimic the auto attack combo.

The problem with new people is when they get hit their first reaction is to hit back or cast.

In rock paper scissors if someone is spamming rock why would you keep spamming scissors I don’t know. Maybe because you think he wont do it again???

Shukran.4851:

i could say the same when i face mesmers. for me thief is a pain in the a fighting a mesmer, while he just sit in his aoe with his illusions,stuns,chaos,conditions.

or watch thieves running after eles because his combo is 50% usefull against them.

but….game is still young, everyone still need to improve.

Of course.
What makes me angry are people who say “The game is fine. The balancing is fine, you just have to learn to play” when obviously it isn’t the truth. Everyone can reroll thief/mesmer/guardian and do fine but there are people that don’t want to because they want to play the class they love and than ask for ANet to balance the game, which is the right thing to do in my opinion.

I’ll just sing more about Quickness.

No skill no matter what the game is should provide a 100% Attack Speed increase, cause that will always only ruin things. Specially in a game where there’s hard hitting attacks with relatively “Low” HP… (Attacks hitting for 9k when players can have ~20k)

So yeah remove quickness n all is fine n dandy. If you must have an attack speed increase make it 25% or something low not bloody 100% :S

Ps. I’m an Engi main so no I’m not trying to defend thief since I hate them myself. Just pointing out the true problem.

Whole skills dedicated to stealth detection seems a bit over-the-top.

Having conditions appear regardless of stealth when they tick damage would be neat. There’s already a trait that removes conditions whilst in stealth, so it wouldn’t be class-breaking.

Also, break stealth on skill use even if it misses. You can just keep using backstab until it hits, which seems a bit silly.

UptheIronz.6732:

dreaming on guys , good players can kill thief really easy , it’s not meant as an offend no, but u really need to l2p , stealth detection is not needed , brain is

Skilled players can fight against a thief easily and win and make him run away. But if the thief decides to bail there is almost no way to stop him and kill him….depends too much on your class. Hence why we want to have stealth detection.

UptheIronz.6732:

wrong just to clarify how thief vanish again into stealth , it’s a skill called clock and dagger needs cast time and needs to stay at the same place cause u cant cast it while running and third and most important at all if u move i miss it cause it has a low range , so yeah if u wanna nerf stealth fine by me , u have to compensate somewhere else , cause hard hitting thieves has 13k hp

now about mesmer they need a nerf to their huge hp pool which is by default 24.5k
that’s 11.5k more than thief almost double the hp , and decoy can be casted instantly

and mesmer doesn’t have to stand still , so now tell me which class needs a nerf ?

thief or mesmer ?

i play both

If you play thief then why are you conviently leaving out all the utils that let a thief stealth like blinding powder, shadow trap, shadow refgue, etc, plus the heal that also stealths.

And no the mesmers base HP is not 11.5k more than a thief it is about 5k more.

Let’s just get this done:

Nobody loses against a spam-thief.
Nobody loses against a strict power+precision thief either.
You cannot compare great thieves with the spam-thieves.
Spam-thieves do not even get close to succeeding half as much as a great thief.

A spam-thief will not achieve anything against anyone with even the slightest brain activity.
A great thief will be able to fight, through clever usage of his initiative, yes – initiative, the disadvantage the thief is cursed with.
A great thief will be able to know exactly when to use this initiative, and when to save it.
He will be able to fight competent players because he does NOT go “LOL, PRESS 5 THEN 1 THEN 5 THEN 1 THEN 5 THEN 1 WIN”

A spam-thief will fall flat on his face if he is in the above-mentioned mindset.

There’s a lot more skill to the thief than you think.

Initiative is a disadvantage. Not the opposite. If a thief had cooldowns, it would suddenly be brain-dead easy. But it doesn’t. It does not have several cooldowns, but ONE cooldown. One cooldown across the whole board. Use X, lose Y. Use Y, lose X.

What other classes have this? None.

Rika.7249:

Let’s just get this done:

Nobody loses against a spam-thief.
Nobody loses against a strict power+precision thief either.
You cannot compare great thieves with the spam-thieves.
Spam-thieves do not even get close to succeeding half as much as a great thief.

What you said has no real base except your experience, which, as a thief, isn’t valid.
I did it and I succeded. Bunch of people did that and succeded. Here’s another guy that did it and succeded but posted a youtube video about it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh5zjK7ITpQ

You now should realize that defending that status is useless.

sorrow.2364:

Rika.7249:

Let’s just get this done:

Nobody loses against a spam-thief.
Nobody loses against a strict power+precision thief either.
You cannot compare great thieves with the spam-thieves.
Spam-thieves do not even get close to succeeding half as much as a great thief.

What you said has no real base except your experience, which, as a thief, isn’t valid.
I did it and I succeded. Here’s another guy that did it and succeded but posted a youtube video about it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh5zjK7ITpQ

So my experience, as a thief, isn’t valid.

He’s not fighting competent players.

That’s all there is to it.

A thief can punish bad players more than any other can.

Thieves ARE punished when they meet a good player.

Notice how all of his enemies are practically not doing anything about him.

SO OP.

No, seriously.
Run that spec in a tournament.
Get owned.
Repeatedly.
Then start speccing cleverly and stop pressing 2.
Suddenly you contribute.

I’ll just say this once and for all – unless you’re completely absolutely 100% gearing power/precision, you have NO reason whatsoever to use Heartseeker unless the target is below 25%.

What I will say about thieves is that I find it akittenshame that having 30 in Precision is pretty much mandatory. 20% damage when enemies are below 50%. I don’t see how anyone could do without it – but that’s probably just a personal preference.

Just stating a thief’s point of view.
Personally i don’t care much about stealth, the only reasons i “mainly” stealth is because in stealth i can use backstab and it becomes a 100% crit chance(with the trait)

I’ve rarely seen thieves that attack me from stealth directly….
Usually it’s Steal – cloak and dagger – Assasins signet – backstab – heartseeker -

Ex

Typical argument by someone who is clueless. Your attacking my attitude towards thief rather than trying to provide evidences to argue against my point.

maybe if there was a little less acid in your tone you could do more then incite an argument. presentation matters. and the fact you even bring up evidence to form against your point is also silly as i AGREED with you that 20k damage in 2 seconds from one class is unbalanced, i just disagreed with the way to fix it.

And your opinion that nerfing backstab damage won’t solve the problem leads to absurd implication: so if bactstab damage is halved, 20k damage will be just as easily achievable?

i didnt imply that, if you thought i did thats a failure on your part not mine.

Plus, I have a problem with the amount of stealth skills thief has available and how easy they can be spammed regardless of whether they are bugged.

first THEY ARE BUGGED, so before any nerfing happens, you need the bugs fixed, as many of them are beneficial to the thief. the rendering issues are a big one, revealed sometimes not applying like it should are also big ones. Now, ive brought it up in other threads but i do think the ability to subvert the revealed debuff by hitting your stealth CD’s back to back before they fade is a little cheese and id be ok with that being taken away, so you will never see a thief in stealth longer then 3-4 seconds if the bugs are fixed (aside from shadow refuge, but you know where he is if hes using that). But just cuz you have a problem with something, doesnt give you the right to label it as OP “incoming i can say whatever i want drivel” saying whatever you want regardless of the basis behind it just leads to a disolving rhetoric and is the same thing as plugging your ears and going NO.

Sadly to you whether my opinion is invalid due to fact that I do not FULLY understand thief and whether I FULLY understand class balance is irrelevant here because Im gonna voice my opinions anyway and let the developers judge whether they should nerf thief or not.

like i said

It’s just your opinion that my opinion is invalid; I can say your defending theif only because you play thief and you know nothing about class balance, but that doesn’t mean anything either.

what lends more credit? garbage thief comments, or people trying to outline why something would or wouldnt work? clean up your comments and id reply with much more respect. of course this is a internet forum, nobody would do that >.<

Rika.7249:

sorrow.2364:

Rika.7249:

Let’s just get this done:

Nobody loses against a spam-thief.
Nobody loses against a strict power+precision thief either.
You cannot compare great thieves with the spam-thieves.
Spam-thieves do not even get close to succeeding half as much as a great thief.

What you said has no real base except your experience, which, as a thief, isn’t valid.
I did it and I succeded. Here’s another guy that did it and succeded but posted a youtube video about it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh5zjK7ITpQ

So my experience, as a thief, isn’t valid.

He’s not fighting competent players.

That’s all there is to it.

A thief can punish bad players more than any other can.

Thieves ARE punished when they meet a good player.

Of course it isn’t valid, because you are a thief and thief is your profession! Your point of view is extremely biased.

What let you think they aren’t competent? They are player and that’s what matter. You shouldn’t know if they are competent or not. There are many other videos on youtube explaining how to effectively spam Heartseeker. (lol)

And, if they aren’t competent as you said, all professions should be able to punish incompetent players at the same level, that’s what I call balance. Same opportunities.

All professions are punished when they meet a good player, but obviously an extremely good Necromancer/Elementalist/Engeneer/Ranger will never defeat an extremely good Thief.

bad players

dont dodge
dont spec or use damage mitigating skills or traits cuz they want MOAR DAMAGE
tunnel on one enemy and ignore others to there detriment
still have the turn keys on there keyboard (seriously, if you pvp, remove them and remap the strafe keys to them, there is NEVER a time where you want to keyboard turn)
tab target (horrible)

if its a PW thief vs a bad player, that bad player WILL NOT DODGE the PW, the thief doesnt have to precast, pair it with immobilize or haste, that bad player will just stand there and take it then complain

if its a backstab thief, that player will see him go into stealth and NOT DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT, he wont even make room, and he will keep his back where it has been.

the people making thieves and posting these videos, are using hotjoin pvp where the majority of these bad players exist, so in the hectic 8v8 all they are doing is racking up kills on players that dont know jack.

Rika.7249:

There’s a lot more skill to the thief than you think.

Initiative is a disadvantage. Not the opposite. If a thief had cooldowns, it would suddenly be brain-dead easy. But it doesn’t. It does not have several cooldowns, but ONE cooldown. One cooldown across the whole board. Use X, lose Y. Use Y, lose X.

What other classes have this? None.

Thief is one of the easier classes, the disadvantage of initiatve is it is finite, however it also allows burst in a way other classes can’t get, zero cooldowns (other than utils/eilte/heal) is easier to manage than cooldowns and the finite nature of initiative is mitigated to a large extent by being having the best escapbility in the game and the ability to reset fights.

Franky I think Anet have failed with their aims in regard to thiefs, I seem to remember they claimed they were going to avoid the mistakes of other MMOs, but all they have avoided is permastealth, it is still the same old stealth->huge burst->escape at will, that plagues other games

sorrow.2364:

Rika.7249:

sorrow.2364:

Rika.7249:

Let’s just get this done:

Nobody loses against a spam-thief.
Nobody loses against a strict power+precision thief either.
You cannot compare great thieves with the spam-thieves.
Spam-thieves do not even get close to succeeding half as much as a great thief.

What you said has no real base except your experience, which, as a thief, isn’t valid.
I did it and I succeded. Here’s another guy that did it and succeded but posted a youtube video about it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh5zjK7ITpQ

So my experience, as a thief, isn’t valid.

He’s not fighting competent players.

That’s all there is to it.

A thief can punish bad players more than any other can.

Thieves ARE punished when they meet a good player.

Of course it isn’t valid, because you are a thief and thief is your profession! Your point of view is extremely biased.

What let you think they aren’t competent? They are player and that’s what matter. You shouldn’t know if they are competent or not. There are many other videos on youtube explaining how to effectively spam Heartseeker. (lol)

And, if they aren’t competent as you said, all professions should be able to punish incompetent players at the same level, that’s what I call balance. Same opportunities.

All professions are punished when they meet a good player, but obviously an extremely good Necromancer/Elementalist/Engeneer/Ranger will never defeat an extremely good Thief.

the only way your gonna get tha level of balance is thru homoginization of professions and abilities.

and while i dont know about necro, a extremely good ele or engi will definitly be able to fight toe to toe with the thief (maybe not literally, but in terms of winning chance)

seriously, all this whining about spvp is hilarious. lets get some coordinated premade tpvp complaints. oh there is none…thats cuz in tpvp the thief is again, only as powerful as the opposing team is knowledgeable and coordinated.

sorrow.2364:

Rika.7249:

sorrow.2364:

Rika.7249:

Let’s just get this done:

Nobody loses against a spam-thief.
Nobody loses against a strict power+precision thief either.
You cannot compare great thieves with the spam-thieves.
Spam-thieves do not even get close to succeeding half as much as a great thief.

What you said has no real base except your experience, which, as a thief, isn’t valid.
I did it and I succeded. Here’s another guy that did it and succeded but posted a youtube video about it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh5zjK7ITpQ

So my experience, as a thief, isn’t valid.

He’s not fighting competent players.

That’s all there is to it.

A thief can punish bad players more than any other can.

Thieves ARE punished when they meet a good player.

Of course it isn’t valid, because you are a thief and thief is your profession! Your point of view is extremely biased.

What let you think they aren’t competent? They are player and that’s what matter. You shouldn’t know if they are competent or not. There are many other videos on youtube explaining how to effectively spam Heartseeker. (lol)

And, if they aren’t competent as you said, all professions should be able to punish incompetent players at the same level, that’s what I call balance. Same opportunities.

All professions are punished when they meet a good player, but obviously an extremely good Necromancer/Elementalist/Engeneer/Ranger will never defeat an extremely good Thief.

Yes, they obviously will.

That’s the difference.
They absolutely 100% will.

And because I play a thief, my point of view does not become biased.

I can however provide some insight you didn’t have.
Such as heartseeker spamming just doesn’t work against competent players.
I am to judge that these are not competent, simply by looking at the footage. Once necro just runs away with his back turned. Like, seriously. No dodging. Just auto-run button pressed and /afk.

And we certainly agree that every profession should be able to punish the bad.
Luckily, most can!

Warriors can.
Engineers can.
Thieves can.
Elementalists can.

That’s 4/8.

But we agree, every profession should be able to punish the bad, and as such, I propose that every profession is given initiative. Then everyone can punish everyone by pressing 2.
3x dragon’s tooth incoming same spot!
3x 100 blades!
3x blunderbuss utility combo!

So on, so on.

Of course, using any of the said will also put everything on cooldown.
Everything. And we’d also need to adjust the abilities, so they do not have too powerful control options. We don’t want more than 1/2 sec immobilize, or 2 second cripple.

You know, I’d totally swap initiative for cooldowns any day.

Because thieves are at a disadvantage from the very start, and pressing 2 repeatedly won’t help you kill that elementalist, who’s going to immobilize you and burst you to smithereens.

Wolfe.3097:

thats cuz in tpvp the thief is again, only as powerful as the opposing team is knowledgeable and coordinated.

This man speaks the truth.

A thief feeds on bad players, and is helpless against good.
He relies solely on the enemy’s mistakes. If he can’t land some devastating blows from the start, initiative will slowly kill him.

sorrow.2364:

There are many other videos on youtube explaining how to effectively spam Heartseeker. (lol)

All professions are punished when they meet a good player, but obviously an extremely good Necromancer/Elementalist/Engeneer/Ranger will never defeat an extremely good Thief.

1- Most of those videos are outdated or have old content.
Heartseeker was nerfed, and i still laugh at bad thieves spamming it when your at full health, the attack does around 2K damage when your at full health, the max I’ve done was 6K crit on a light armored, from behind when he had less then 25% health.
Dancing dagger does far more damage at full health, up to 4.5K and it’s a bouncing between enemies attack + criple….

I beg to differ, I’ve seen good thieves that i know are good take a beating from both epic necros and Engineers, rangers not that much since they are fairly an easy pray.
However CCing a thief is one of the easiest way to kill him, and if he stealth’s as a engineer or necro NUKE THE PLACE, put down traps, trow grenades, use your flamethrower….. playing my engineer i hardly had any issue with beating thieves, i constantly blind and immobolise them.

You can say a Thief is an easy class to play, it sure is against bad players, spamming heartseeker against them does the job, however it takes more then that to be a good thief, you would know it if you played such a glass cannon profession.

If your a warrior, 100B or Eviscerate can easily take down any thief.

Ex

There is no way to let you know how Thief is at the moment, you will always find a weak excuse to your insane high damage and great survivability thanks to stealth.
I want to invite you guys to play an Elementalist or a Necromancer for more than 2 days to realize how thieves are easy to play and incredibly effective at low skill levels.
Please, do this and then come here to answer this topic.

noobs… no comments (sic).

I’m one of the biggest thief haters there is but this is a terrible idea.

Providing stealth detection in any form considering what a short amount of time thieves have it up and how it’s the basis for many of their skills is a bad idea.

What needs a big nerf is either their damage or escape abilities. They are the only class in the game that gets a passive 25% speed boost if I’m not mistaken. They can shadowstep away or simply briefly stealth and then run away. Not to even mention their downed skills. Please tell me how it’s fair that the highest damage dealing class also has the most speed and best ways to escape? I hear a lot of thieves complaining about having low hp but if you’re never getting hit and can escape at any time what does it matter? Not being hit> high hp & armor

A soft nerf to their passive damage boost in thier trait lines, a few abilities, as well as to their escape mechanics is the right way to go. The good ones will still be good and the bad ones will cry foul.

Haven’t played Necro or Elementalist, in sPvP yet, did play Engineer and i had no issues beating thieves.

Ex

UptheIronz.6732:

wrong just to clarify how thief vanish again into stealth , it’s a skill called clock and dagger needs cast time and needs to stay at the same place cause u cant cast it while running and third and most important at all if u move i miss it cause it has a low range , so yeah if u wanna nerf stealth fine by me , u have to compensate somewhere else , cause hard hitting thieves has 13k hp

now about mesmer they need a nerf to their huge hp pool which is by default 24.5k
that’s 11.5k more than thief almost double the hp , and decoy can be casted instantly

and mesmer doesn’t have to stand still , so now tell me which class needs a nerf ?

thief or mesmer ?

i play both

I play many different class types also in spvp. i have an 80 Mesmer and Guardian.
and i think both Thife and mesmer need a nerf (thife a larger nerf). as mermers could get a nerf on some exploitative utilitys. they also may get a fix to shatter as they dont seem to connect a lot of times if the pathing for the mesmer is odd, like the lip at windmill to the east of the point they bug out if they have to run along it, is some other cases this could be partly due server lag.

I was fighting a necromancer as an elementalist with a guardian earlier today, when suddenly a thief jumped on me from stealth with super high burst damage (mainly backstab). I wasn’t insta-gibbed though, and since I’ve been told that thieves should be easy to deal with if you can survive their initial burst, I thought it was the perfect time to retaliate. But no, as soon as I got a few damage skills off, he vanished in stealth and appeared with full hp. This is just one example of what seems to be very common in spvp now and not even the worst case scenario.

Before you say thief burst is balanced think of these high-damage skills in the game (While these percentages are rough estimates, they should give you the idea):

Warrior Eviscerate: Deals maybe 80% of backstab’s damage – easily avoidable if you pay close attention

Engineer Jump Shot: 70% of backstab’s damage – avoidable if you dodge before the engineer hits you. Requires the engineer to stand on top of you to do max damage.

Elementalist Dragon’s Tooth: 70% of backstab’s damage – most obvious skill in the game

Thief Backstab: Very high damage – unavoidable unless you know there is a thief just around and you can perfectly guess when the thief is going to hit you.

Not only that, but thieves also got access to Assassin’s Signet which increases the damage of their next attack by 50%. I think a lot of people underestimate the power of stealth in this game. While it last for a limited (albeit rather long) duration, it doesn’t break on damage and lingers for a second or two after it breaks.

I am aware that thieves are rather weak in pve, but I sincerely hope that ArenaNet looks into their damage in pvp, since this gets rather frustrating. Along with backstab, pistol whip and heartseeker damage as a finisher might be a bit too strong, but that’s not as big of a deal.

Hopefully, the experience anet has will result in a quick fix to the current problem with a couple classes being insanely OP. Thieves make up roughly 50% of all classes in scenarios. If you level up a new character, you will notice they make up even more of classes you will see being leveled.

Given another couple of weeks, Thieves will be complaining about other Thieves, since that is all they will see in sPvP.

ok sorrow, on the other end lets see some coordinated, vent using, highly skilled thief in tpvp vs other highly skilled.

you want to raise the skill floor you better find ways to raise the skill roof too

Some arguments crack me up, no really they do…

1. But thieves are fragile
Maybe if you catch them but when they are in stealth often…well, it is hard to hit them. Also, why do you need a lot of health if you take away 50-75% of someone’s life with the opener alone?

2. But when people get support my thief dies quickly because he is so fragile
Guess what? Hardly any class survives a 1 vs 1+X fight assuming that all people know what they do. Also, you always claim to be such assassins: then do not attack a target which gets easily support because an assassin would have screwed up in their planning at that moment.

3. Bwaaah waaah waaah my thief has no chance versus mesmers
Hey, welcome to the club. Too bad that their op mechanic proves to be the bazooka to your scissior.

Nevertheless it is not just a “thief problem”. The burst damage is too high across the board. If you get caught 1 sec unaware or your stunbreaker is on cd, it is game over. What a crappy balance.

sorrow.2364:

2. When a stealthed player get struck by any hit, there should be something to let the attacker realize he hit the stealthed guy. As it is now, you can only swing the air having no clue of there the enemy is going.

There are some ways to do so, but they are situational. for instance, I use Signet of Malice (heals when I hit people) and I can tell if I hit a stealthed unit. Of course, you also have to not be at full HP, otherwise the healing won’t show.

Just a note.

auhfel.4129:

sorrow.2364:

2. When a stealthed player get struck by any hit, there should be something to let the attacker realize he hit the stealthed guy. As it is now, you can only swing the air having no clue of there the enemy is going.

There are some ways to do so, but they are situational. for instance, I use Signet of Malice (heals when I hit people) and I can tell if I hit a stealthed unit. Of course, you also have to not be at full HP, otherwise the healing won’t show.

Just a note.

Also, if you got a weapon ability that chains, you’ll know you hit someone stealthed when you get to the second skill in the chain. However, I think that stealth should break on damage, atleast direct damage

Unfortunately, my information comes only from WvW as I do not take part in sPvP. But, thieves move ridiculously fast, cannot be caught and when you do, they have way too many abilities to avoid damage and get away (stealth, teleport, etc…). Then, in the off chance that you do get them down, their downed abilities are also prioritized on getting away. Now, the problem is that the get away part actually works more in favor of “get my friends here”.

You may argue that thieves do a ridiculous amount of damage and I wholeheartedly agree (no one should be able to do 3/4 damage in a single shot). The spinning move they do is also ridiculously overpowered (uninterruptable, stuns, high damage, AOE, wish I had a game over button… and if you need evidence there’s a youtube where a thief takes advantage of it, quite a lot).

But the real kick in the pants is with this infinite power, they also are one of the hardest classes to kill. If you can catch up to them and you can see them long enough to stop and kill em… they still have downed abilities that make you want to sling your monitor across the room. And just about then, they’ve bought enough time for his friends to come and kick your butt. Seriously?!?

The deck is stacked largely in favor of the thief.

Daays.4317:

It takes just as little skill to counter a thief. Blind or a slow+dodge roll away would counter the signet backstab burst. The key to stopping a BS thief is to dodge the initial burst and then kite him at <400 range with a constant cripple. No real way to close that gap, unless he wants to HS spam nothing, or risk using Shadowstep only to get knockdowned/stunned after using the ability.

Considering he’s an engineer Smoke Bomb from the Bomb kite is a pulsing AoE blind. Toss that down and you won’t take any damage. Toss down a cripple, and you’re kitting the thief easily with swift+vigor.

Pressure always makes you play hectic. This is most likely a case of shock at the burst + old man panic under the pressure.

He’d be dead before he could even cast that elixir..

Let me get that straight:

The class that is build for mobility and burst should NOT have mobility and burst.

I am confused… What should thiefs to then? Please explain with examples.

Cal.1985:

Let me get that straight:

The class that is build for mobility and burst should NOT have mobility and burst.

I am confused… What should thiefs to then? Please explain with examples.

It depends on what kind of bursts. 2 skill kill is easywin, not burst.
But, exactly, in which part, burst or mobility, stealth belongs to?

Please provide me with a good build that has all three. By all three I mean to benefit/use in synergy the stealth the mobilidy and the burst

2 Skill killing a glass cannon is normal. Move along. Stop whining about the backstab.

Cal.1985:

Please provide me with a good build that has all three. By all three I mean to benefit/use in synergy the stealth the mobilidy and the burst

2 Skill killing a glass cannon is normal. Move along. Stop whining about the backstab.

Well, I’m not running any glass cannon, I always run with at least 1700 toughness but I still get killed with 2 skills. Steal + (Cloak and Dagger if you haven’t the trait that stealth you on steal) + Backstab + Heartseeker if I’m not dead yet.

Want a build which synergize stealth, mobility and burst? The one everyone is running!

Dagger/Dagger + Shortbow

Hide in Shadows, Blinding Powder, Assassin’s Signet, (free slot), Thieves Guild.

Put traits randomly around but be sure you have Mug and win.

Please excuse my confusion but how steal + backstab + heart seeker are 2 skills?

Why on earth are you not moving/dodgin after the dmg and seeing the thief going invisible?! It is even worse if the thief uses CnD (IT HAS CAST TIME). The thief has a maximum of 4 seconds during which he can land backstab. Get a way, use blind, use knockdown use anything to prevent the thief doing dmg on your back in the for 3-4 seconds. If you manage to get away:

Steal is on at least 30 (or more? not sure with 30 in thrickery) CD or the thief lost 6 initiate due to CnD.

This build is a one trick pony. It is easy aviodable in 1v1. In group fights well its harder but still doable.

People learned to avoid bull rush + hundred blades WHY on earth you can`t learn to MOVE when you see a thief wearing a dagger in MH getting invis close to you?!

Cal.1985:

Let me get that straight:

The class that is build for mobility and burst should NOT have mobility and burst.

I am confused… What should thiefs to then? Please explain with examples.

Afaik anet never said that the thief should have that.

Well Cal, your right and your wrong.

Your right in the fact that thieves should have the ability to be a burst class and be mobile, ( it is not set in stone that they must be just because you have played 20 MMO’s in the past were this was true! Because everything else in this game is already different from other MMO’s) BUT your also wrong in the fact that you should not have any greater burst than any other class nothing in the design on GW2 suggest you should have an advantage SMALL or LARGE over any other class in the Burst area ( if X class is truly speced fro pure burst).

Will there be a Class that is better than the next at so and so absolutely because mmo’s are always getting updated and changed. It can never be balance if it ever was to be balance GW2 would release new content and toss balance back out the window.

Because of job security. thieves will be changed its good for business. i played a warrior in BWE1 and i remember how everyone would scream how OP i was i did not use 100b’s lol i used a Far more OP spec at the time 14k chain crit double axe evisc Shout tank build with 100% crit i got nerfed also =) good business move!

Also id like to say Thifes have a very low skill floor and a high skill ceiling! if they nerfed thieves Burst to match every other class, this would also open thief up to try other speced that will be just as strong ( if the thief is skilled).

@Lilbeezy
In general I agree. Here is the problem. The skill that bursts is Backstab. No arguments here right?
This is the only burst skill in game that has so many requirements:
1. Stealth
2. Getting behind targed (in 3-4 seconds window)
3. Strike

Its a mele skill so target must stay close, the targed must not dodge or use any skill like aoe knockdown, aoe blind and so on. Hell he can put blind on you before you go to stealth assuming you are not using CnD.

I understand the cry about bursting backstab with the signed. I don`t understand WHY people don`t try to play better. It is not hard to avoid.

Cal.1985:

Please excuse my confusion but how steal + backstab + heart seeker are 2 skills?

Why on earth are you not moving/dodgin after the dmg and seeing the thief going invisible?! It is even worse if the thief uses CnD (IT HAS CAST TIME). The thief has a maximum of 4 seconds during which he can land backstab. Get a way, use blind, use knockdown use anything to prevent the thief doing dmg on your back in the for 3-4 seconds. If you manage to get away:

Steal is on at least 30 (or more? not sure with 30 in thrickery) CD or the thief lost 6 initiate due to CnD.

This build is a one trick pony. It is easy aviodable in 1v1. In group fights well its harder but still doable.

People learned to avoid bull rush + hundred blades WHY on earth you can`t learn to MOVE when you see a thief wearing a dagger in MH getting invis close to you?!

Well, I’ve explained all the possible combos, but most the time Steal+Backstab is enough on professions with low health like elementalists. I was talking into a Necro perspective, I’ve higher health pool, so usually poor thieves have to use also Heartseeker to kill me. I know it is hard and tiring, but that’s it.

Dude, you have no idea when to dodge! With warriors you clearly see it coming in Bull’s Charge, with thieves you have no idea when he is going to hit you with backstab and wasting all the endurance to avoid just the opening skill looks stupid to me.

Who cares if you fail first attack? Use Cloak and Dagger and you are in stealth again! Failed also with Cloak and Dagger? There is Blinding Powder on your skillbar! You failed also with Blinding Powder? Then you mush have taken some damage, there is Hide in Shadows! Failed also with Hide in Shadows? Than you are a total noob! But no problem, you should have enough initiative to retry Cloak and Dagger!

Unfortunately, you target, when has lost all his endurance, can’t dodge anymore…

@sorrow
I think you are completly ignoring the Reveal debuff. You cannot just re-stealth. No offense but If you don`t have ANY other means to avoid dmg except dodge… its your build problem, get fear, chills, slow, blind etc (not really familiar with all necro skills)

Cal.1985:

@sorrow
I think you are completly ignoring the Reveal debuff. You cannot just re-stealth. No offense but If you don`t have ANY other means to avoid dmg except dodge… its your build problem, get fear, chills, slow, blind etc (not really familiar with all necro skills)

You think that is that hard to avoid hits while in Reveal? Thieves have dodge too!

Well, I’ve no other means to avoid damage against invisible target. I can cast a mark in the ground to fear the thief for 1 second (lol) or chilling him, assuming he is enough stupid to walk on it and I cast the mark near the thief, but I haven’t anything else.
Really, looks like you don’t know other professions.

my browser just locked up after typing this huge post so ill just sum up what i was gonna say, aside from Back stab i think the thief as a whole does to much damage vs other glass canon specs i see. and they have more survivability than most Glass Canon. if my team wanted me to roll a dps roll in my 5’s i can say ATM i would gladly pick a Thief or Mesmer over a warrior.

and if ANet feels thief’s are to strong? maybe they don’t and it will stay bit if they do i hope they keep it competitive. at the end of the day i would like to see this game because a good competitive mmo in the e-sports seine.

And thief’s are not the only thing that need to be changed i think.

Cal.1985:

This is the only burst skill in game that has so many requirements:
1. Stealth
2. Getting behind targed (in 3-4 seconds window)
3. Strike

You underestimate how powerful stealth is in this game, it makes steps 2 and 3 much easier. It’s unreasonable to combine stealth with the highest damage ability in the game. You cannot dodge it, and the thief only needs to use one button. The situation gets even worse once the fights get bigger. In a 2v2 or 3v3 it’s much more difficult to accurately determine when the thief goes into stealth, how long the thief has been in stealth and so on.

To beat a reasonable experienced thief you cannot do a single mistake. Meanwhile the thief has a shot at winning a fight, even if he/she fails with openers. Backstab needs a flat 30ish percent damage nerf and even after that the damage might be too high.

@sorrow
Reveal is a 3 seconds debuff that prevents the thief to go into stealth again.

Now as I do not know all necro skils I went to the wiki and found some that will prevent direct dmg:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Haunt
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Well_of_Darkness
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Axe#Necromancer oh the retaliation hurts
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Dagger#Necromancer immobilize, blind
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Warhorn#Necromancer daze

Now I have not bothered to list all cripple and chill effects as they are rather soft then hard counter.
Please explain me how you don`t have ANY other means to protect yourself from a backstab specced thief.

I want to make a clarification, I play a thief. I don`t use backstab (its boring). I have seen many thiefs going on me with backstab…. almost none of them killed me. Backstab for me it is easy to avoid.

I agree it is high dmg ability, maybe a bit over the top, however I think it is more play better issue then the skill itself. I don`t wont to offend anyone with this personal opinion.

Ok…i’ve played with almost all classes in sPvP, and now I’m playing mostly with guard or elementalist, an i can say that i don’t have any problems with thiefs 1vs1, most of the time i will kill them. Easier with guard, but also not so hard with ele. But the problem is when there are 2 thiefs…that combo can kill me faster than any other combo, but I’m not complaining, it’s the way thiefs work, and they really don’t need so much nerfing (if any).

@cal:
All the skills you listed are uneffective, except Well of Darkness, but it is on a heavy cooldown and most the time it doesn’t worth an utility slot.
Axe on Necros are useless, the retaliation is for 3 seconds and other skills on Axe do so poor damage that it isn’t worth to use it in a weapon set for just one skill.
Haunt and Dark Pact requires a target, and Wail of Doom has a cone pattern, pretty useless considering that you don’t know where the thief is (so is a matter of luck) and 2 seconds daze isn’t enough.

I’m not saying I can’t avoid Backstab, of course it can be avoided when dealing with not so good thieves, but it’s like the Moa Morph. If you don’t avoid it, you are most likely screwed. The imbalance isn’t on a undodgeable skill, but on skills that if not dodged are way too destructive and looks like both thieves nor mesmers want to understand this.