Also might do a Viper Zerk rune test if anyone is interested.
That would be interesting although it’s obvious that Dagger will win this.
Most definitely. I’ll probably also throw in pistol for that test.
That’ll be really interesting – cheers! If it’s not too much work, I’d be really grateful if you could include pistol in your top post’s numbers as well, using the same method. I won’t make any big point out of it, but it’d be interesting to see what we’re dealing with here.
Viper numbers are posted. I’ll add pistol DPS to the other tests when I can, but based on the viper test, I wouldn’t expect much.
lol @ pistol AA…so horrible.
Yeah, I had a little chuckle there too – good thing I love gallows humour.
Cheers for doing that Zodryn: Much obliged.
Thief doesn’t belong in group support and buffs. We’re straight up assassins, name an mmo where the assassin dolled out buffs like he’s a paladin/priest type.
It’s like people don’t know how to place a character archetype.
Rift.
You can play any roll as Rogue, from assassin to a bard to a ranger to a healer. Also tank.
Rift is the closest game I could find to Guild Wars 1 where you can literally play anything as basically 1 class and has a ton of build diversity.
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Guide_to_playing_as_an_assassin
Also i briefly looked over the meta battle and most every build is basically some form of dagger spam.
Edit: Also after looking it over, rift (all of five minutes) looks like it tried to be Ragnarok. Thing is once you’re a bard, you lack on damage, and rift seems to have a different debuff/buff system. You listed an mmo, fair enough. Now go play it.
I’ll throw in The Secret World as the gold standard for build (mostly…) however you want – which unfortunately I’m spending most of my time playing now, since GW2 can’t give me five decent skills to use.
Just rambling now but I find archetypes interesting: The two MMOs who get the feel of P/P the most right IMO (TSW and Wildstar) both associate the set with being team buffers and healers.
But dual pistol is more Rogue than Assassin… kind okittenwardly* squished in with Thief in GW2.
*FFS: ‘awkwardly, kind of’.
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Yeah sorry, insomnia, haven’t slept in 24 hrs.
Cool, that makes sense then. Yeah, I’d say that Unload is spot on and certainly doesn’t need any further buff – or nerf! It’s the only thing that makes P/P archetypally feel and function right IMO.
But then we have a too-weak AA, not sure anybody likes #2 as it is atm, and #4 and #5 are only useful in some content but not at all useful (and compete for Ini with Unload) in other content.
Makes the set boring to use after a while… and it’s been a while… and it looks like it’ll continue to be a while…. Beyond that, there are plenty of threads already out there about how to fix Thief pistol; I was just attempting to answer your overall question about why folks might prefer P/P than bows or rifles, or the Eng faffy pistol options.
Have a nice kip when you get round to it.
My Asura Ranger has a bit of a Robin Hood theme going on; her pink moa is called…
Maid Moarian.
To reiterate what I posted before. This patch shows us yet again how little attention goes toward profession and combat development.
Our characters… those professions we name… and play for thousands of hours… and pour lots of $ into, and the combat experiences in all game modes, are the #1 most important aspects of this game.
GW2 is an amazing AAA game in many ways. It also has some amazing combat elements, like freedom of movement and a real “smoothness” to gameplay, but has CCC professions.
I was hoping that this year would be the year y’all start scrapping “things” and rebuilding professions, but this first patch shows that it’s just the same old status quo spread sheet number crunching with regard to professions and combat.
I’m not being rude, just being direct with this so I hope y’all can accept it… Profession development “departments”/projects/“to do” and wish lists are underfunded, and the patch notes clearly show how out of touch and disconnected things are. I know y’all play, but please take your eyes off spread sheets and take the red pill to pull yourselves out of the numbers matrix ok?
Y’all want roles? Fix professions.
Y’all want spvp and esports to be good? Fix professions.
Y’all want to push the envelope with harder and more challenging content? Fix professions.
Y’all want to have the most kick kitten wvw experience for players? Fix professions.
Y’all want players making more and more characters and dropping thousands of $ to outfit these characters? Fix professions.
Want long term retention and high monthly concurrent numbers? Fix professions.
Want more referrals and great exposure in the gaming world for being known to have the best professions and best combat experience? Fix professions.
Professions 2.0. It’s time. Players deserve that investment, and that will all translate to more money in the coffers… Take the team and make it happen. Fix professions.
Is that matrix or metrics? Yup, this is a QFT post if there ever was one – good work!
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Well, my P/P main got literally nothing at all different and useful in this balance patch, so she’ll continue to be in ‘log in for the reward, run around and shoot stuff for a few minutes, being all cute and funny, log out, play another MMO (with a far smaller Dev budget than GW2) for a few hours, with good dual pistol skills’ mode for at least the next three months I guess? At least she didn’t get nerfed….
You guys think you’ve still got it bad? Luxury! BTW, Babazhook, it was Yorkshiremen:-
Not being pedantic there, but if you lived oop north, you’d understand.
I agree with the overall vibe of the OP though. A few passives here and there don’t do any harm, even if it’s just to help you survive when a game thing happens (lag spike, dat camera moment etc). I mean in general, and not saying anything about the specifics here. And being reasonable and disciplined in what we ask for is the way forward IMO.
I guess a little thanks and giving credit where credit’s due, from those who feel like they have been buffed, probably wouldn’t do any harm either.
I’d personally leave other classes out of it though, especially Warriors – no need to saying anything negative about those guys here.
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It’s always the problem with universal generalisations; folks think that the gripe they’re making about a specific type of Thief in a specific game mode applies across the board – and all Thieves end up catching the flak.
You might not need more AA damage but any Thief who runs a pistol main hand does (not that it looks like they’re going to get one…), and those traits might be useless to you but not everybody else (eg I use Flawless Strike and, to me, Signets of Power is completely useless… but I don’t suggest to get rid of it because of that…).
Re: The inevitable nerfs incoming down the line: I’m thinking that all the buffs being given now will manage to completely miss my (vanilla P/P) main, so she won’t benefit at all. Next balance patch after that will have ‘All Thieves’ nerfs to reduce the buffs that only some of them are getting now; and my main will end up even worse than she is now.
Didn’t pistol just get more damage? What was wrong with that?
First up, I’m not playing ’Who’s got it worst’, since I’d like all Thief weapon options to be equally fun and viable.
I also find it disgraceful that GW2 makes so much more money than a couple of other MMOs that I play (so should have far more resources to throw into balance for everybody), but has worse skill sets, and expects those at the bottom of the heap to wait for months and months to get necessary buffs while it spends only the minimal resources to fix (at best!..) only one little subset; kicking everything else even further to the right.
Sure, on 29th Sept 2015 pistols got:-
- Vital Shot: Increased damage by 24%.
- Unload: Increased damage per shot by 26%.
- Sneak Attack: Increased attack damage per shot by 25%.
But they also got:-
- Ankle Shots: Removed the hidden range increase that this trait unlocked.
And we got this from our esteemed Karl:-
“FYI the damage increases weren’t part of a re-work of pistols or anything (something I’ve discussed in the past). We realize it still needs some work to get it to where we want, but we wanted to get it closer to being to that point with these changes. We’ll be looking at pistols more in-depth in the future.
-Karl"
Unless he pulls it out the bag, with a last-second reveal in the patch notes, pistols have been kicked to the right to the next balance patch after this one; 8 months at best. That’s 8 months counting from the last pistol buff, but even that’s not really right since the buff wasn’t that great anyway for MH pistol users.
Those that also use OH pistol benefit from the buffed Unload [which is awesome IMO!], but #1 and #2 are still rubbish [and #4 and #5 are no use to me either, when running P/P in most of the content I play].
Ideally, #1 (basic cheap/free/builder whatever) should be worth using in itself (as it is in TSW or Wildstar say) and not be garbage that you only use because it’s free: it should have a proper fix… but, in the meantime, I’d take a further damage or RoF buff just to keep us going until it’s done properly.
That’s what’s wrong with that, since you asked. My worry now, like I wrote, is that pistols will be skipped in this patch, with the intention that they’ll get fixed in the patch after this one… but some Thieves working properly after this patch [and more power to ‘em, and I’m genuinely very pleased for them] will lead to all Thieves getting nerfed.
So not only will pistols not get their fix but they’ll end up nerfed to worse than they are now, without ever even having the pleasure of a few months of balance, fun and awesomeness before the nerf.
We’ll see.
1 My point was that pistol was already buffed damage wise – but you still call for more damage buffs. So if the increase as it is now isn’t enough another likely won’t be enough either. The damage is out of control since June anyway which makes most if not all fights RNG and rather boring as it’s usually “hit first = win”.
2 Also, how does an OH pistol thief profit from the buffed unload?
P/P has always been kitten – and I’ve been around for 2 years – my guess is that it simply lacks utility. So, in my opinion, the devs can’t just buff a bit damage here and a bit there and it will work – until they don’t redesign it it will never work.3 And btw: thief is my favourite class – I don’t know all weapon sets that well but I never looked down on anyone because he was using this or that set or wanted that set/build to be gone – not even the stealth trapper build.
1 You’d have to experiment a bit with Vital Shot to see how unbelievably, incredibly weak it is. What that means is that it was uber-weak before the buff; so the buff wasn’t enough. Note that I won’t keep asking for more damage, once ‘enough’ is actually reached; same as I was delighted with the Unload buff and constantly argue strenuously that we should just leave it as is now.
I’m not after out of control one-shotting human opponents, but having an AA that doesn’t require 4-6 shots (if SoA and SoF don’t proc), from my max-DPS built, full-Ascended gear (except earrings) Thief, to drop a wolf in Queensdale!
2 I wrote, "… since the buff wasn’t that great anyway for MH pistol users.
Those that also use OH pistol benefit from the buffed Unload."
So it’s “MH pistol users” + (“also”) “OH pistol”: those who fulfill both parts, to either side of the “also”, profit from the buffed Unload. Aye, the set’s biggest problem is that it’s a complete dog’s dinner, failing to do much of anything synergistically or well (except hit stuff hard with Unload spam).
It does need a proper fix but, in the meantime, a further buff to Vital Shot (damage or/and RoF) would help to keep us ticking over until Anet eventually deigns to fix pistols properly. The AA doesn’t need to do anything fancy, just hit decently hard (or/and have a decent RoF) would be ample. The set’s utility would come more from a sorted #2, #4 and #5.
3 Yup, your Thief credentials are beyond any doubt, and I wasn’t suggesting that you did look down on anyone; sorry if you got the impression that I thought you did.
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I’m a bit fed up with Anet’s complete inability to give me five Thief P/P skills that are generally useful and balanced; so have returned to TSW and messed with a few other MMOs that have dual pistol as an option.
TSW still holds up well (especially their world-beating skills system), except for the clunk-factor, but the others are just dire compared to GW2.
Everything from the cookie-cutter questing [‘You want me to what?!’], other players being a PITA who stop me doing what I need to do (kill/loot/node stealing or breaking my quests), horrible animations [nothing anywhere is a patch on my ‘LOL… dawww’ Asura] to horrible controls/camera and jerky chop… GW2 has thoroughly spoiled me.
There’s a fairly recent one, not doing very well, that does potentially have a few nice touches, but is so choppy, with such bad questing and UI, that I constantly think, ‘How dare you think that you can get away with this in a post-GW2 market?!’ I’m sure you know which one I mean.
Please Anet, fix my skills so I don’t have to play these other, drastically inferior [except for TSW], games for my ‘Slinger done right fix. Won’t someone think of the Asuras?!
Is this based on real quarterly sales? No.
This is a prediction by a third rate analist firm who have never in all those years predicted something right.
The only effect this sort of posts have is atracting trolls, who go all doom and gloom, like they Always do.Got some stats about the financial firm (not analist firm)to back up the hyperbole. The problem with posts like these is it attracts trolls from both sides. Btw it’s analyst ,attracting and affect LOL.
Oh look a spelling troll, who doesnt give one bit of constructive feedback. Whats the relevance of your post other then offending?
Aye, it’s especially obnoxious when they take it upon themselves to ‘correct’ others, when they are incorrect. Your ‘effect’ was correct; his/her ‘affect’ was incorrect.
And with punctuation as bad as his/hers, he/she has no right to be ‘correcting’ anybody else. LOL… or something….
you pvers have gotten everything you wanted out of balance for the last three years.
it’s your turn to wait.
My P/P Thief main is scratching her floppy ears in confusion and asking, “Huh? When did that happen?”
I found this a good page to bookmark, for a handy summary of which stats combos are available (scroll down for the newer combos):-
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Item_nomenclature#Triple_attribute
I imagine (could be wrong) that the limiting of Fer is for sound balance reasons: it’s such an important stat for power builds, and you need so much of it to work properly, and it’s so limited, that it forces people to make hard choices (esp power build or condi build) and not become too OP.
Essentially to stop people doing what you want to do….
Cheers.
The main differences between these two examples (GW2 and Star Trek) are: reproductive viability (often the core of the morals of the day regarding sexual taboos); and ‘otherness’.
Humans, Vulcans, Klingons, Romulans and Cardassians (etc) can all successfully breed with each other, and it’s established in lore that we’re all made of pretty much the same stuff, with only minor differences.
That wouldn’t be the case for most of the species in GW2 I imagine?
And since the ‘otherness’ isn’t that ‘other’ in ST, the different races can often look more exotic and attractive to each other (like many feel about Elves). Attractive rather than repulsive (eg Human and Charr, or Human and Asura… probably less so Human and Sylvari given the more superficial similarities, despite the greater biological differences).
Now, the likes of yourself may have overcome these parts of yourself (assuming for the sake of argument that this is a good thing), but it’s important to give a thought to why others may not be able to do so quite so easily: You’re dealing with some pretty deep and hardwired stuff here.
As for the reproductive viability, they normally can’t, that’s correct. But some of those races in Star Trek can’t either without help, and I’m sure that if a bunch of asura bent their minds to it, they’d find a way to make human/charr work.
But let’s leave humans out of it for a minute, and look at charr and norn instead. Most people have no problem with seeing norn as attractive, there’s even a NPC female voice line where she comments on how attractive she found a norn man. There are stories where humans claim to have norn blood in their family trees. And yet, norn and charr are pretty similar for the purpose of this discussion. Both evolved on Tyria, both bigger than humans, both just as alien to humans (biologically speaking). And with their culture and their gift for shape shifting, one could even say that norn can be more beastial than charr are.
The only real difference is that, most of the time, norn look more human. That isn’t the right standard to judge this by, surely.
[My bold.]
There are two main things going on here:-
1 The ‘Ewww’ factor of inter-species sexual relations;
2 The semantic objection to the word ‘bestiality’.
For #1, we’re back to reproductive viability (and sense of ‘otherness’) as the main things that are responsible for how it would be generally (i.e. by >> 50% of people) viewed; since even yourself couldn’t help but refer to them, even when you said to leave humans out of it.
Not wanting to get into whether the ‘Ewww’ factor would be right or wrong ethically, but just pointing out that the ‘Ewww’ side’s response is fully understandable, and should be empathised with, rather than denounced out of hand.
I would rather not see inter-species sexual relationships in the game for a couple of reasons:-
i One of the things that anti-homosexual folks say is that if homosexuality is normalised then it’s a slippery slope to bestiality being normalised – if the game did, ‘in fact’, follow that trajectory then they can point at the game and say, “See! We were right!” Let’s not give them any more ammo.
ii If Human-Charr then why not Human-Asura? One of the best things about GW2 is being able to play the super-cute (but kind of humanoid) species innocently, without all that ‘Creepy, pedo’ garbage following those players around. The ‘otherness’, and absolutely no sexual relations between Humans and Asura, are important to preserve here, for this reason.
For #2, been a while since I studied biology but isn’t the main difference between ‘breed’ (or ‘race’ when talking about humans/sapients politely) and ‘species’ reproductive viability (yes and no respectively)?
So Human-Norn, especially in view of their visual similarity, is totally fine and not inter-species, at least in this respect. Every other permutation is inter-species. Semantically, would that be ‘bestiality’? Since the word derives from the Latin for ‘beast’ (a non-sapient animal), then I’d agree that it is the factually incorrect word to use, and is an insult to those sapient beings on the receiving end.
So… after all that, I agree with you about that.
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Meanwhile, I enjoy making stuff for my desktop and logon screen… ;-)
Hilarious! Cheers for sharing those.
My main loves her kite but she looks a bit odd in a combat crouch pose while she holds it at rest. I wish she’d just stand upright… in a kind of ‘holding a kite’ pose.
Clearly, this is of the utmost priority – plz get on it Devs.
Wonder if there’s Power/Crit-Chance/Healing power stat set, can’t remember off the top of my head.
Zealot’s, JFYI.
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No worries – I hate tumbleweeds.
Main thing is that I don’t like arbitrary-seeming gaps in our gear choices, so would like a Valk and Mara equivalent (switching Vit -> T) just because there isn’t one yet. Similarly, I’d like Soldier’s Exotic trinkets and Valk Ascended ones.
For me particularly, my main is an extremely underpowered set of an extremely underpowered class (vanilla P/P Thief) so there isn’t any slack built in to accommodate any wasted stats at all; much as I prefer rounded, balanced builds.
After trying a more-survivability approach, I found that a more-damage output approach worked much better (as in, I died less often and was more generally useful). For this I needed a lot of Pow and Fer; Fer being particularly important to figure in because it’s so hard to get in adequate amounts (it’s never the primary stat on any gear, presumably for sound balance reasons). Adequate being >900 without buffs.
But I still needed just enough survivability to take the edge off incoming damage that hits. For Vit, this wasn’t a problem, since my proc-heavy build needs more than Zerk level Prec to work properly; so my damage went up as I switched some Zerk pieces to Mara, then stabilised with another piece (but giving me some Vit in the bargain).
Then I added a further Mara piece, which gave me a surplus of Prec but dearth of Pow and Fer; switching another Zerk piece to Valk restored that balance, with only a little damage loss but a chunk more Vit.
Problem is T since there is no stat combo that lets me do the piece by piece trade-off equivalent. I’ve squeezed a tiny bit in with the stats that come with my Traveler Runes, plus some Infusions, but it ain’t much – and I can’t reduce my Fer (or Pow) further.
Switching my Zerk backpack to my Celestial backpack is the best of a bad job option here (since at least it has some Pow, Fer and Prec), but a Mara/Valk equivalent is what I really need.
Sorry if you were thinking more of new stat combos where the char wears that full set, to the exclusion of all else, but my main doesn’t have that luxury unfortunately.
I hope that some of all that might be of some use to you.
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What I’d personally like:-
1 Ditch the bleeds and increase RoF to make crits (and their procs) more likely.
2 Increase projectile speed and Immob duration. Make it dirt cheap, losing the Vuln if necessary.
3 As is.
4 Make it cheaper.
5 Make the blind field move with the Thief, in line with their thematic run ‘n’ gun nature.
Either #2 or #4 (depending on which works best with P/x and x/P sets) has 1200 range, so we have that option to shoot from outside death field range, like every other class has; especially in view of our extreme squishiness.
Bonus points for Steal switching to Reload when P/P is equipped. Reload is primarily an Ini regen (~4-5 Ini).
Double bonus points for the Daggerstorm animation switching to an ‘Equilibrium’ style, TSW bullet ballet animation… I know, I know….
If they did all that, I’d never need to play my other MMOs to get that proper ’Slinger done right fix.
I found it to be a pretty useful ‘bunch of good stuff all in one line’ spec when I was levelling, and then for the learning to get gud phase at max level while I was still playing around with different builds and gear to find what was best for me. Heals, condi-cleanse, stun-break, vigor, and sprint when I really needed it.
Sure, it’s not much use (or more precisely: is a luxury that you just can’t afford, given the must haves in other trait lines) when you get through to the other side; but I’ve no problem with something existing that can help newer Thief players get there.
If it gave an always on speed buff (with no weapon requirement), I’d probably slot it… though it would cause me a lot of angst deciding which must have line to ditch for it. It’d be worth it to get my Rune choice back. I often feel that the Traveler Rune’s ‘buffs’ are mocking me: ‘Boy, your class just sucks across the board *doesn’kitten [Trollface.]’
*This censoring system’s out of control: the word I wanted was ‘it’, not the ‘kitten’ that it was rendered as… much as I love kittens….
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Confining myself to just the classic, core game… if you know what I mean (re: passive aggression).
I’m pretty old and have always loved RPGs; and am very into my chars. GW2 has given me a main who is far and away my favourite char I’ve ever come up with: a cheeky-faced little Asura slinger.
Got ~800 hrs on her and she still constantly makes me laugh with her funny little animations. Over Christmas, one of my relatives was down, due to a bereavement. I got a nice permanent bell from a daily present here, figured out how to play ‘Jingle Bells’, dressed my funny little main up in her pink and white Fancy Winter outfit (sooo cuuute!!!), and she worked her magic with my relative, cheering her up nicely.
One of the largest, most attractive and varied worlds that I’ve come across in a game, with some of the best music.
I love playing Barbie and this game has let me do that to an enormous extent, and without ever once having to buy a disgusting and loathsome gambling bag/box to get a skin I wanted.
Such a fantastic questing/levelling system, that really does encourage cooperation rather than competition, that when I play other MMOs I can only SMFH and ask, ‘What is this – the stone age?!!’ This makes it the only MMO where I’m pleased to see other players nearby as I adventure, rather than wish that they’d all go away. Also leads to one of the best (PvE anyway) MMO communities I’ve come across.
Well optimised, so the combat is very fluid and slick without having to tank my graphics settings.
I’ll never be the world’s best gamer, with these old reflexes o’ mine, but most games have enough leeway built in that I do pretty well at endgame; even if that’s mostly by finding a gear/build combo that offsets my rubbishness.
Not being passive aggressive here, but my main in this game (vanilla P/P Thief) is so incredibly, ludicrously underpowered, regardless of gear/build, that it’s forced me to learn to play to an extremely high standard just to keep my head above water and not be one-shotted all the time, let alone do well. It’s the highest skill achievement I’ve ever reached in any game.
I’d agree that it’s good to take the time to enjoy the game and world that they’ve created for you; especially if, like me, you find that the core maps are just much more pleasant, pretty and enjoyable than the later maps (which are also good as a skill/build test… but just not as nice).
Make your peace with the fact that you will always be super-squishy, and avoid falling into the ‘Just a little bit more Vitality and Toughness…’ trap, done so incrementally that you don’t realise that you’ve completely tanked your damage output (which will actually make you die more frequently).
Can’t advise as to the social side that you asked about, since that will be personal to yourself, in terms of what you as an individual are looking for. I guess the main thing to mention here, that took me by surprise, is that you join a guild on an account basis, rather than specific char basis. Knowing that a bunch of strangers can see when I log in or out, where I am, and know who all my alts are creeped me the heck out so I left (not that I had any reason to mistrust anybody there… I’m just a very private person).
If that doesn’t bother you, then plenty of guilds are advertising themselves in chat, so you’ll find one that sounds like your style quick enough.
Best of luck, and I hope that you stick with your Thief. It can be extremely demoralising sometimes, but once you get good, and dance unscathed through all the stuff that used to one-shot you, it’s a feeling of fun and achievement higher than most classes or games can give you.