Guild Wars 2

I know what you guys are thinking, that I’m an idiot for suggesting this due to initiative, but really, how hard is it to manage? I consider Initiative similar to energy in GW1, if you run out of it, you’re doing it wrong, plain and simple. Before anyone thinks I’m just kittening about thieves because I hate facing them, much the opposite. I’m kittening about it because I play one, and really dislike what I can do to people. I posted the screenshot only to show people that I do play thief a lot. Yes, my rank isn’t very high, my wins/loss are, while above 50%, not spectacular, but that isn’t the point.
Thieves should have a cooldown of anywhere from 1/2 to 2 seconds on their 2-5 skills on all weapons. I never understood why it has been okay to spam Heartseeker to get kills. Or spam Headshot a few times causing someone to be unable to act, while the party kills him. These are just a few examples, but I hope you can understand my point.

I’d rather this not turn into a troll thread, or a “bash the OP thread” sorta thing, just a discussion, arguing in favor of, or opposition to the topic at hand.

They seem to be reasonably well balanced for it atm. I used to really hate thieves but between some nerfs they’ve taken as well as just plenty of experience against them at this point, I can’t say I really see it as a problem.

<—- non thief player defending thieves. Who knew this day would come?

As I have also played thief, I can agree with the original poster.
I’m not complaining, I’m just saying.
It also doesn’t help that you can’t see it coming and react accordingly to at least defend yourself a little.
These skills do need a cooldown however, all the other professions have cooldowns with their weapon skills and thieves don’t because of the factor of initiative. The same rules should apply to all professions.

seacanari.4583:

As I have also played thief, I can agree with the original poster.
I’m not complaining, I’m just saying.
It also doesn’t help that you can’t see it coming and react accordingly to at least defend yourself a little.
These skills do need a cooldown however, all the other professions have cooldowns with their weapon skills and thieves don’t because of the factor of initiative. The same rules should apply to all professions.

Ok. Give us a burst or f2 f3 f4 utility if “the same rule should apply to all professions”

PhelanDisturbed.1650:

seacanari.4583:

As I have also played thief, I can agree with the original poster.
I’m not complaining, I’m just saying.
It also doesn’t help that you can’t see it coming and react accordingly to at least defend yourself a little.
These skills do need a cooldown however, all the other professions have cooldowns with their weapon skills and thieves don’t because of the factor of initiative. The same rules should apply to all professions.

Ok. Give us a burst or more utility if “the same rule should apply to all professions”

Lets say I’m a guardian and I’m fighting someone else, I kill them, my skills are on recharge.
A thief shows up when I’m totally defenseless, spams a skill without cooldown when I’m not able to defend myself and kills me before I can even react.

Sounds fun, doesn’t it?
That’s why they need cooldowns, because everyone else has them

Same goes the other way. A thief kills an ele but had to blow all its initiative. Guardian comes up and slaps him around while the thief is defenseless. Same thing…

PhelanDisturbed.1650:

Same goes the other way. A thief kills an ele but had to blow all its initiative. Guardian comes up and slaps him around while the thief is defenseless. Same thing…

Yes, but the thief gets their initiative back (or can) quicker than a skill can recharge. I suppose it does go both ways at times and I’m not saying it doesn’t.

Well, that’s my two cents.

PhelanDisturbed.1650:

Same goes the other way. A thief kills an ele but had to blow all its initiative. Guardian comes up and slaps him around while the thief is defenseless. Same thing…

Here is where your argument has a hole though. If a thief runs out of initiative, he’s doing something wrong =/

Warcry.1596:

PhelanDisturbed.1650:

Same goes the other way. A thief kills an ele but had to blow all its initiative. Guardian comes up and slaps him around while the thief is defenseless. Same thing…

Here is where your argument has a hole though. If a thief runs out of initiative, he’s doing something wrong =/

And here is where the opposite argument has a hole in it…
If all your skills are on cd, you’re doing something wrong.

Exactly. So a thief who plans ahead should be punished?

Your skills are meant for the fight at hand, if someone shows up before you can recover, that’s one thing. If your skills are on recharge after facing someone, and someone else shows up, that’s bad luck. Recharges even as low as 1 second are still, in a way, passive Initiative management. Since if you can’t expend it, it can only build.

Thief crying over heartseeker? Other than the skill playing the game for you by it’s auto-flip around if they’re behind you it’s whatever.

A thief spams HS on you 3 times you know thats 9 ini. In comparison another prof could come, leap to you, Hit his other skill, use another skill for damage, weapon swap and pull out another damaging skill.
If you couldn’t handle 3 HS, you were likely not in a position to handle 3/4 skills from any other prof.

Warcry.1596:

Your skills are meant for the fight at hand, if someone shows up before you can recover, that’s one thing. If your skills are on recharge after facing someone, and someone else shows up, that’s bad luck. Recharges even as low as 1 second are still, in a way, passive Initiative management. Since if you can’t expend it, it can only build.

While I understand your point of view, I respectfully disagree with your opinion that applying a 1 second cd on thief skills constitutes Initiative Management.
Not only do thieves not need help managing initiative (if you haven’t figured it out and are wasting your whole pool, you need to keep practising and learn rotations and skill costs) but it would severely hinder some skills ability to perform.
Infiltrator’s Strike comes to mind, although this may be an exception to your rule since it is a chain skill.
Before the new information we learned about Flanking Strike in this week’s SoTG, S/D #3 was one of our only boon hate skills. If your target has stability and might, a quick double hit of Flanking Strike is one of your only options.

But knowing how this game is, one should expect things like this and plan accordingly regardless of profession… at least I would think others would share my mindset? I’m not just saying this as a thief, but also as an engineer. I make sure that if need be I’ve got a way out depending on what is coming in. Say you as a Guardian finishes your fight. .. why does it have to be a thief to finish you while you’re skills are on cooldown? Why not an ele? Or a mesmer?

Warcry.1596:

Your skills are meant for the fight at hand, if someone shows up before you can recover, that’s one thing. If your skills are on recharge after facing someone, and someone else shows up, that’s bad luck. Recharges even as low as 1 second are still, in a way, passive Initiative management. Since if you can’t expend it, it can only build.

I find thief perfectly fine,

Thief: Initiative = cooldown for weapon skill on both weapon set
Other classes = Profession have 2 weapons set with cooldown and class related ability F1 – F4

So if your keeping initiative then you are doing something wrong, why are you holding back in a fight. So you can’t really say that thief have no cool down, initiative is a weapon wide cooldown, it just lets you off load your cooldown faster then other profession.

(Edit: Weapon set)

I am not for or against, but I wanted to point out that the current way thief works, essentially negates a while condition – chill…

Swim.6830:

I am not for or against, but I wanted to point out that the current way thief works, essentially negates a while condition – chill…

Except for their utilities, elite and heal. And their F1 skill. Let’s not mention how crippled a thief is with -66µ move speed.

Wait, it seems chill isn’t negated at all on a thief.

not completely, but still weaker… maybe it has some influence on initiative regen? or maybe its intended to affect him only partially

Warcry.1596:

I know what you guys are thinking, that I’m an idiot for suggesting this due to initiative, but really, how hard is it to manage? I consider Initiative similar to energy in GW1, if you run out of it, you’re doing it wrong, plain and simple. Before anyone thinks I’m just kittening about thieves because I hate facing them, much the opposite. I’m kittening about it because I play one, and really dislike what I can do to people. I posted the screenshot only to show people that I do play thief a lot. Yes, my rank isn’t very high, my wins/loss are, while above 50%, not spectacular, but that isn’t the point.
Thieves should have a cooldown of anywhere from 1/2 to 2 seconds on their 2-5 skills on all weapons. I never understood why it has been okay to spam Heartseeker to get kills. Or spam Headshot a few times causing someone to be unable to act, while the party kills him. These are just a few examples, but I hope you can understand my point.

I’d rather this not turn into a troll thread, or a “bash the OP thread” sorta thing, just a discussion, arguing in favor of, or opposition to the topic at hand.

I will sacrifice burst for utility, oh wait that is already happening in the next patch. Never mind.

seacanari.4583:

Lets say I’m a guardian and I’m fighting someone else, I kill them, my skills are on recharge.
A thief shows up when I’m totally defenseless, spams a skill without cooldown when I’m not able to defend myself and kills me before I can even react.

Sounds fun, doesn’t it?
That’s why they need cooldowns, because everyone else has them

How is this scenario different from any other class showing up and killing you? Any class that shows up will have everything off cooldown. Why should you survive? If the enemy player had help show up why do you not have help show up?

MaXi.3642:

not completely, but still weaker… maybe it has some influence on initiative regen? or maybe its intended to affect him only partially

And maybe the other classes once they notice their skills are still in cooldown, well they shrug, switch to their other weapon set and carry on. Thief cannot do that, chill or no chill. Which is why having chill reduce initiative regen would be much harsher on the thief than on the other classes.

Nerfed this coming patch, and here we are asking for more nerfs. Tisk Tisk…

I don’t think the skills need a cooldown. Heartseeker is the only one that can really be abused, and even that can be avoided fairly well. Unlike other classes, if a move is missed the initiative is still used so that kind of balances it out.

I think the larger problem is simply initiative regen. It’s the initiative regen that makes things like the d/p build seem overpowered. It’s the regen that allows you to maintain pressure and still spam 4 heartseekers into a target at 50%.

If you’re going to want to tone down thief burst then the place to do it is initiative regen. It isn’t by putting cooldowns on skills.

PhelanDisturbed.1650:

seacanari.4583:

As I have also played thief, I can agree with the original poster.
I’m not complaining, I’m just saying.
It also doesn’t help that you can’t see it coming and react accordingly to at least defend yourself a little.
These skills do need a cooldown however, all the other professions have cooldowns with their weapon skills and thieves don’t because of the factor of initiative. The same rules should apply to all professions.

Ok. Give us a burst or f2 f3 f4 utility if “the same rule should apply to all professions”

you really think your damage will decrease simply because of cooldowns? are you serious? you’ll still do 7k backstabs. you’ll still do 12k unloads whether the cooldown is 0 or 20 seconds. i guess if the thief gets cooldowns, it won’t be the players the thief kills that need to ‘l2p’

The problem is that ini is required pretty much for every skill. When i play my necro i can just use skills that are not on CD and switch weapons and have new set of skill that i can use. On a thief, if i don’t have ini, i don’t have it no matter what weapon i switch to.

I have no problems with HS spammers tbh i know i can dodge/blind that crap and then they won’t have ini to do anything else besides as long as i stay above 50% it won’t do much dmg either.

I am quite surprised this is still a complain though as lately, even in HJ i saw maybe only one HS spammer.

MaXi.3642:

not completely, but still weaker… maybe it has some influence on initiative regen? or maybe its intended to affect him only partially

Try to get backstab off while being chilled, GOOD LUCK!

Thieves initiative system is not at all balanced.They were created in mind that they hav an overall cooldown sharing all their skills but there are a lot of reasons that is simply unbalanced towards other classes.

Nr 1 is that many skills other classes have(thief too) are useless but the thief has the option to trade the cooldown of the bad skill for his good one.Example a warrior using gs nr5 twice in a row and put 100 blades on cd when is needed.It is totally unfair to other classes that only have 1 skill and have to wait to use it again.

A thief can chose to only do a high burst(few heartseekers in a row) if the situation needs it or just play purely defensive applying chain ccImagine a warrior choosing to do 3 final thrusts in a row or 3 shield bashes while putting his other 4 skills on cd?Another class cannot use the burst at will since they have only one or 2 burst skills and usually on long cooldown .Other classes don’t have this choice and it’s even worse that a lot of weapon skills are really bad.

Also their cooldowns(initiative) is not at all affected by chill.The only class getting a free pass from the most powerfull and tactical condition in the game.Why is that ?

Thieves are OK for the most part outside of [Pistol Whip]. The only thing that needs to be addressed are their spammable teleports and teleports in general. The real issue with Thieves with regards to balance is how they just don’t know the meaning of overextending or being in bad position. Their skills instantly forgive them for over committing every time.

It’s really hard not to suggest that the entire class just gets cool-downs, charge skills and longer cast-times and we scrap initiative, or just removing the class entirely. The way that Thief plays now simply put just doesn’t fit well with how GW2 combat was initially conceived.

Swagg.9236:

Thieves are OK for the most part outside of [Pistol Whip]. The only thing that needs to be addressed are their spammable teleports and teleports in general. The real issue with Thieves with regards to balance is how they just don’t know the meaning of overextending or being in bad position. Their skills instantly forgive them for over committing every time.

It’s really hard not to suggest that the entire class just gets cool-downs, charge skills and longer cast-times and we scrap initiative, or just removing the class entirely. The way that Thief plays now simply put just doesn’t fit well with how GW2 combat was initially conceived.

I can say exactly the same with any other class: they “don’t know the meaning of overextending or being in bad position” due to 2 HP bars, due to stability, due to crazy tankiness etc etc. I have a warrior as well and i can screw up so much on him and still not die where my thief would have died 10 times at least. Same goes for my necro.

1 bad dodge on thief, you are dead; 1 bad dodge on warrior, w/e i can face tank it.

No cooldowns no way. Next Post.

I play thief. proof.

Cynz.9437:

Swagg.9236:

Thieves are OK for the most part outside of [Pistol Whip]. The only thing that needs to be addressed are their spammable teleports and teleports in general. The real issue with Thieves with regards to balance is how they just don’t know the meaning of overextending or being in bad position. Their skills instantly forgive them for over committing every time.

It’s really hard not to suggest that the entire class just gets cool-downs, charge skills and longer cast-times and we scrap initiative, or just removing the class entirely. The way that Thief plays now simply put just doesn’t fit well with how GW2 combat was initially conceived.

I can say exactly the same with any other class: they “don’t know the meaning of overextending or being in bad position” due to 2 HP bars, due to stability, due to crazy tankiness etc etc. I have a warrior as well and i can screw up so much on him and still not die where my thief would have died 10 times at least. Same goes for my necro.

I won’t argue against you there. However, you shouldn’t exclude the Thief from that group. They’re all broken. Invulnerability, stability, blocking and teleporting should be culled back in this game.

The problem most people have is when someone brings up “class x” as having issues, someone who plays class x cries “BUT CLASS Y, Z, F, AND Q ARE BROKEN TOO!!” Yes. They’re all broken. They all need to be fixed. That’s why my thread about the topic is so long.

Cynz.9437:

1 bad dodge on thief, you are dead; 1 bad dodge on warrior, w/e i can face tank it.

Except that Thieves get to spam dodges when running full cheese—rather, the meta. It’s not a very unforgiving class when there are teleports and spammable evasion skills available. Furthermore, it’s never really a “one bad dodge and you’re dead” scenario—especially in a 1v1 match-up. Even the glassiest of set-ups can take a few good hits.

In any case, these conversations only solidify my reasoning as to why Thieves just don’t really fit properly into the fundamental combat design of GW2.

Lightsbane clearly an epic necro why u complaining about thiefs?

Swagg.9236:

Furthermore, it’s never really a “one bad dodge and you’re dead” scenario—especially in a 1v1 match-up. Even the glassiest of set-ups can take a few good hits.

Really? Not sure what kind of thief you play or have played against but thieves are the squishiest next to zerk eles. Take a few good hits? Really not really.

Amaterasu.6280:

Swagg.9236:

Furthermore, it’s never really a “one bad dodge and you’re dead” scenario—especially in a 1v1 match-up. Even the glassiest of set-ups can take a few good hits.

Really? Not sure what kind of thief you play or have played against but thieves are the squishiest next to zerk eles. Take a few good hits? Really not really.

As a guy who plays a zerker elementalist, I can say that I can take a few good hits from full hp. However, I have ranged abilities to make up for it. This is what I’m saying about Thief not fitting into GW2 combat.

Because the Thief is so squishy, they’ll blow up in a typical melee bout if they just spam 1. So, instead of re-thinking how a Thief could or should contribute to a battle, instead ANet just gives the Thief gets loads of teleports and invulnerability frames tacked on to many skills to sort of circumvent the typical dangers of encountering and pressing an enemy into melee combat. I mean, I just look at it and stare. It’s the worst design in this game by far.

The Thief needs a complete functional make-over as some sort of combat support de-buffer that can actually do battle normally with quick, passing melee strikes without having to resort to excessive invulnerability frames, or it needs to be struck from the game.

I can understand ANet’s initiative to want to make some sort of unique class that isn’t necessarily defined by cool-downs like the rest of them, but it really backfired on them with the Thief.

I don’t want to argue for or against CDs for thieves but usually RPGs have both a resource like mana/energy/etc. and CDs on spells for all classes.
Thieves lack the CD, other classes lack the resource so basically all classes can more or less mindlessly spam their abilities. Thieves can spam 4x heartseeker, necro can spam 4 marks, spirit-ranger spams autohit. Not much difference if you ask me.
Only thing that has to be balanced well is the initiative-regeneration (and of course the CDs of spells on other classes) because it’s the only limiting factor in this game.
Overall I’d like to see some kind of resource for all classes for more interesting combat but since that’s never going to happen I think thief should stay as it is.

edit: old thread is old

It would certainly add some height to the very low skill floor.
+1
Not being able to spam blinds, cc, and shadowstep sounds good to me.

Warcry.1596:

Thieves should have a cooldown of anywhere from 1/2 to 2 seconds on their 2-5 skills on all weapons. I never understood why it has been okay to spam Heartseeker to get kills. Or spam Headshot a few times causing someone to be unable to act, while the party kills him. These are just a few examples, but I hope you can understand my point.

So you’re a HS spammer? Lol.

And have you seen what the cast time and incredibly short daze duration on Headshot’s like? If you’re “causing someone to be unable to act”, they’re probably AFK.

Initiative is fine, and it’s the only thing that really gives thief a unique flavor to it. If your opponents are dying because you’re spamming one skill, then they’re just bad, and so are you. I’ve faced so many thieves that spam 1, maybe 2 skills, without any thought as to what they’re doing, and they’re complete rubbish.

But go ahead, remove initiative. Completely remove thief from the game.