Guild Wars 2

Raijinn.9065:

Why do you see fit for one profession to have a spammable gap closer, homes right to target, conditions, combo finishers, and huge damage to boot. Why? All in one SPAMMABLE move.

people saying HS isnt spammable must be blind. pick a thief and spam 4 HS without any delay beteween them, if you say have delay you are LYING.

people saying HS isnt spammable must be blind. pick a thief and spam 4 HS without any delay beteween them, if you say have delay you are LYING.

Who’s saying HS isn’t spammable? It only costs 3 ini so you can launch it 5 times in a row. Sometimes 6.

JonPeters.5630:

felivear.1536:

JonPeters.5630:

This is not true, skills have a cast time and after cast based on the animation they use. To ease any thief worries we are not limiting back to back skill use on purpose. This is in fact the point of initiative and why thieves feel different than other professions.

just curious, are you happy with and is it your intention for moves with no cast time to be able to be used in the middle of a move with a cast time? For instance lightning flash during churning earth and steal during cloak and dagger.

Yes this is part of the design of the combat.

The biggest issue with initiative is that it forces you to spam. As a thief, what incentive is there to use any skill other than heartseaker on dagger? I don’t even know what the other skills on my bar do. There is no trade-off involved in choosing which skill to use. When I play other professions, I’m forced to use different skills due to cooldowns and therefore I’m forced to manage which skills I use and when.

The initiative system is poorly designed IMO. It doesn’t give the thief a more “thief-y” feel. In fact, I’d argue the exact opposite. Thieves/assassins are supposed to be highly coordinated and conscious of their actions.

Chi Malady.2015:

JonPeters.5630:

felivear.1536:

JonPeters.5630:

This is not true, skills have a cast time and after cast based on the animation they use. To ease any thief worries we are not limiting back to back skill use on purpose. This is in fact the point of initiative and why thieves feel different than other professions.

just curious, are you happy with and is it your intention for moves with no cast time to be able to be used in the middle of a move with a cast time? For instance lightning flash during churning earth and steal during cloak and dagger.

Yes this is part of the design of the combat.

The biggest issue with initiative is that it forces you to spam. As a thief, what incentive is there to use any skill other than heartseaker on dagger? I don’t even know what the other skills on my bar do. There is no trade-off involved in choosing which skill to use. When I play other professions, I’m forced to use different skills due to cooldowns and therefore I’m forced to manage which skills I use and when.

The initiative system is poorly designed IMO. It doesn’t give the thief a more “thief-y” feel. In fact, I’d argue the exact opposite. Thieves/assassins are supposed to be highly coordinated and conscious of their actions.

i would appreciate some kind of “combo” gw1-style:
start combo with skill #1,
then skill #2 and #3 become part of the combo with different effects,lengthening the combination of comboes a thief can do.
worst english ever. sorry

I’ll translate:

“I can’t dodge a Thief with kittenty burst, who I could kill in 2-4 hits because they have kitten health and armor.”

Also, at Chi Malady, you’re a terrible Thief if you think heartseeker is the best idea and don’t even know the other abilities for D/D besides Cloak and Dagger. Sounds like you can’t hit the skill-cap.

The biggest issue with initiative is that it forces you to spam. As a thief, what incentive is there to use any skill other than heartseaker on dagger? I don’t even know what the other skills on my bar do. There is no trade-off involved in choosing which skill to use. When I play other professions, I’m forced to use different skills due to cooldowns and therefore I’m forced to manage which skills I use and when.

I almost never use Heartseeker on my DD/SB Thief, it’s a complete waste. I almost exclusively use Death Blossom, then Auto when it’s down, Dancing Dagger on packs or distant enemies. I don’t use C&D, but it’s essential to stealth Thieves. It’s all about how you spec. With other classes, it’s all about the rotation, cycling through all (or most) of the abilities on your bar in the optimal order. With Thieves it’s about having a toolkit and only having to use one or two of the tools. Each of the tools has a very good function, if you’re designed to use it, but if you’re designed to use a specific tool then the other ones aren’t nearly as useful.

Still, thiefs spam abilitys without delay make confusion condision mesmers happy

I’ve got an idea and I’ll probably be flamed by thief-main players for this one….but how about this to control spam:

• Base Initiative regen increased slightly
• Initiative regen slows as more initiative is spent
• Spending all Initiative triggers a long-count cooldown to start Initiative regen

That last part wouldn’t be longer than maybe a second or so, but it would be enough to give pause. And these changes would be enough to make thieves think a little more and possibly have a rotation instead of going D/D and spamming 22222222 when their Steal+CnD+Backstab didn’t finish their target immediately, then swapping to a shortbow and teleporting at a 900 range twice while stealthed.

possante.8310:

im a mesmer

i stopped reading here…

mesmers complaining bout thieves…always fun…

Redscope.6215:

I’ve got an idea and I’ll probably be flamed by thief-main players for this one….but how about this to control spam:

• Base Initiative regen increased slightly
• Initiative regen slows as more initiative is spent
• Spending all Initiative triggers a long-count cooldown to start Initiative regen

That last part wouldn’t be longer than maybe a second or so, but it would be enough to give pause. And these changes would be enough to make thieves think a little more and possibly have a rotation instead of going D/D and spamming 22222222 when their Steal+CnD+Backstab didn’t finish their target immediately, then swapping to a shortbow and teleporting at a 900 range twice while stealthed.

Assuming i dont spam any skill but i just, as thief, use all 5 skills in a row, you dont die. i have cd to start initiative regen+ slow regen cause i used all my initiative.
cool way to destroy thief class.

Shukran.4851:

Redscope.6215:

I’ve got an idea and I’ll probably be flamed by thief-main players for this one….but how about this to control spam:

• Base Initiative regen increased slightly
• Initiative regen slows as more initiative is spent
• Spending all Initiative triggers a long-count cooldown to start Initiative regen

That last part wouldn’t be longer than maybe a second or so, but it would be enough to give pause. And these changes would be enough to make thieves think a little more and possibly have a rotation instead of going D/D and spamming 22222222 when their Steal+CnD+Backstab didn’t finish their target immediately, then swapping to a shortbow and teleporting at a 900 range twice while stealthed.

Assuming i dont spam any skill but i just, as thief, use all 5 skills in a row, you dont die. i have cd to start initiative regen+ slow regen cause i used all my initiative.
cool way to destroy thief class.

So we’re assuming that you don’t play intelligently, yes you’d get destroyed. Like any other class. Your overall base regen would be faster and your top-end regen would be faster…so assuming you ‘pounce’ and eat your initiative up, you’ll have to think on your feet a little like anyone else that facerolls their keyboard.

The problem is, the thief is the only class you really don’t have to play intelligently right now and still have a good chance of winning. Even if you don’t win, you have the best chance to escape alive in the game. If you’re a very skilled player, you just never die as a thief…you never have to.

Redscope.6215:

The problem is, the thief is the only class you really don’t have to play intelligently right now and still have a good chance of winning. Even if you don’t win, you have the best chance to escape alive in the game. If you’re a very skilled player, you just never die as a thief…you never have to.

TILL this part i though i could have a good discussion about thief. nevermind.

Shukran.4851:

Redscope.6215:

The problem is, the thief is the only class you really don’t have to play intelligently right now and still have a good chance of winning. Even if you don’t win, you have the best chance to escape alive in the game. If you’re a very skilled player, you just never die as a thief…you never have to.

TILL this part i though i could have a good discussion about thief. nevermind.

There’s only two things you can have a discussion about with thief-only players: how much nerfing needs to be undone, and how much other people need to “L2P”

Since I’m talking about niether, I wasn’t expecting a good discussion from you.

Redscope.6215:

Shukran.4851:

Redscope.6215:

The problem is, the thief is the only class you really don’t have to play intelligently right now and still have a good chance of winning. Even if you don’t win, you have the best chance to escape alive in the game. If you’re a very skilled player, you just never die as a thief…you never have to.

TILL this part i though i could have a good discussion about thief. nevermind.

There’s only two things you can have a discussion about with thief-only players: how much nerfing needs to be undone, and how much other people need to “L2P”

Since I’m talking about niether, I wasn’t expecting a good discussion from you.

It’s never going to be a good discussion, one side will QQ and say nerf, other will defend saying l2p, there is no middle ground and it’s impossible to be objective, been this way since day one, only real tie breaker here is anet and already know what side they are on.
There are people out there who can stop a thief, so it’s not impossible, those that can’t either don’t know how or had there stuff on CD and unprepared, (in with case it doesn’t matter which class jumps ya, your still going to die, thievs just make it quick and plainless)
So about we end is discussion, because it been going in circles for ever now.

I’ve got an idea and I’ll probably be flamed by thief-main players for this one….but how about this to control spam:

Play TOR (I haven’t since playing this game). It uses the same mechanic on their thieves and it’s boring as kitten. There is also a mechanic where players can choose toboost their damage based on having high Ini, I’ve never found that worth it and maybe they should buff that to make it more enticing, but I definitely disapprove of turning Ini into TOR “Energy.”

So we’re assuming that you don’t play intelligently, yes you’d get destroyed. Like any other class.

Setting fun aside for a moment and just considering pure balance, this really doesn’t work well. Thieves are designed to burst out. What balance they have is based on the idea that they flip out and burn all their ini as fast as they can, and then dodge around a bit as it recovers. Thieves are not designed to be played by making a single attack and then pulling back a bit and repeating at intervals. If you’d like to test your theory, you can do so in game right now, just take a reasonably high level Thief, or take a new one into SPVP if you don’t have one yet, and then just moderate yourself, fighting in such a way that you do a three count in your head after each attack to simulate the need to ration ini. I doubt you’d do very well.

The problem is, the thief is the only class you really don’t have to play intelligently right now and still have a good chance of winning. Even if you don’t win, you have the best chance to escape alive in the game. If you’re a very skilled player, you just never die as a thief…you never have to.

That’s not true at all. Any class can be spammed reasonably well. My current Guardian rotation is actually a lot of fun. I have a GS/Scepter-Focus build, and almost every fight is the same, 4352~25431111~repeat. Give or take. There are more buttons involved, but the rotation is no more mentally intensive than a Thief’s, a bot could do it and while he might not be quite as savvy as me, it wouldn’t make a huge difference in most fights. With a Thief, you usually don’t have to worry too much about which button you’re hitting or managing cooldowns, that skill is not terribly important to a Thief player, but positioning can be vital. The skill in playing a Thief is in active avoidance and movement.

Now, I will say that of all the classes I’ve played, my Thief is probably the least likely to die in a dangerous situation. This is true. It has absolutely nothing to do with initiative though, it has to do with utilities and Traits. Thieves tend to have a lot more “escape” buttons than other classes, emergency resets that allow them to get away from sticky situations. They need these because when things go wrong for a Thief they go wrong hard and fast, but they do mean that a well played Thief can escape situations that would doom many other classes (my Guardian, for example, is invincible. . . until he’s not and then he dies very painfully and unavoidably). There are other classes that can be good at escaping too though, Mesmers, D/D Eles, Necros, basically the squishier a class is, the more escape options they tend to get.

Redscope.6215:

The problem is, the thief is the only class you really don’t have to play intelligently right now and still have a good chance of winning.

always useful when direct insults wouldn’t be enough…so let’s tell us stupid thieves your rank and how you end up on this stetement, i assume you are at last a r50 top tpvp player to say thieves don’t need to play good to be good…am i wrong,? Because you know…actually bad thieves are the most easy stuff to faceroll…and playing guardian and ele also i have to say that it’s much more difficoult to stay alive and win with a thief without a ton of healing, protection and cond removal than ele or guardian for example….and if you spec on healing and def you can go cond dmg only…and pretty much every guardian, necro or whatever with 2 cond removal skills equipped can screw you anytime…just for you to know…

So let us know if you have some others pro tips to give us

what if instead of long duration stealth , they give thief more evade skills?and some more blink skills. something like s/d #3 or p/d #3 but in every set. so ppl won’t lose target, won’t fight a battle with a 24/7 stealthed oppponent, skills will be used smarter.

Heartseeker is the only problem.

brunohstein.9038:

Heartseeker is the only problem.

HS is the skill that separate good players from noob players.
the ones who can avoid HS, dodge, and deal with it , and the others who can only whine .

tbh, hs isn’t always dodge able.. played my nec and it hurts to see how thief can spam heartseeker all day with a 450 range gap closer… no skill required at all… sometimes on my thief i try to shadowstep the opposite side hes facing and guess what…
he INSTANT turned with his heartseeker and kept spam it. especially for a glasscannon it hurts. i play thief myself and im not that fond of heartseeker, but oh boy it requires alot of skill to press 2222222222222222 and chases wherever he goes, u can even blindfold the player and lets see if he kills some 1…
just make heartseeker target ground skill, so atleast he has to aim a bit and that people won’t get chased ANYWHERE they go.

Kirei.1792:

tbh, hs isn’t always dodge able.. played my nec and it hurts to see how thief can spam heartseeker all day with a 450 range gap closer… no skill required at all… sometimes on my thief i try to shadowstep the opposite side hes facing and guess what…
he INSTANT turned with his heartseeker and kept spam it. especially for a glasscannon it hurts. i play thief myself and im not that fond of heartseeker, but oh boy it requires alot of skill to press 2222222222222222 and chases wherever he goes, u can even blindfold the player and lets see if he kills some 1…
just make heartseeker target ground skill, so atleast he has to aim a bit and that people won’t get chased ANYWHERE they go.

i like this, but ground target = buff a little the damage

The thief could have been designed to use cooldowns on weapon skills just like all the other classes and it would still feel ‘different’ without copying the rogue’s energy concept from WoW.

Oh well, if you can’t beat them just copy them.

The low skill:high reward ratio of HS is the biggest issue. Either the damage should be reduced to match the low skill required or the skill requirements need to come up (eg: make HS aimed instead of seeking).

Make Heartseeker an aimed skill WITHIN a frontal cone. Seems to be like the obvious fix. No need to adjust damage, range, or cost and see how it plays out. Don’t see how coding this in would be too hard. Using this skill in succession makes it far far faaar too easy to track an opponent, and negates their positioning/escapes pointless.

I could be game for having HS damage lowered to almost nothing > 50% Health if Death Blossom was raised a little bit.

Derk.3189:

The thief could have been designed to use cooldowns on weapon skills just like all the other classes and it would still feel ‘different’ without copying the rogue’s energy concept from WoW.

Oh well, if you can’t beat them just copy them.

I completely agree. I’m just looking at some ranger skills right now, daze on their GS is a 30s cd. On thief? nope, have them 3-4 times in a row, no problem.

There really are this many people who still die to Thieves that spam Heartseeker?