Guild Wars 2

Elxdark.9702:

Alatar.7364:

Elxdark.9702:

You can still play Staff as it was meant to be with DA

Excuse me, but why do you think that Staff was ment to be played with DA?

Sorry that was more like a personal opinion than a fact, I personally like to play staff with DA I think they support each other really well, acro for me is too many dodges.

if u take another look at it this build with DA requires less to no spamming 1 skill to play efficently bc when u do a vault u need to make 100% sure it hits. so u rely on observing and bursting as well. i just wanted to point out that this is going in a good direction.

i witness more and more bugs with vault. there are lots of scenarios in pvp and pve where vault does not work properly.

Well thief did not need condi cleanse at all, bc auf evades. So in my eyes, nerf evades to buff cleanse helps beginners but weakens advanced players.

D/P suffers less from the endurance nerf then Staff. But Staff is no option anyways until they fix vault.

oh anet… please explain this..

well they removed the quickness bug, but whats waay worse: vaults cast is still longer then before. which means they either dont get it or intended to slow it down without mentioning it in the patch notes. again: the endurance nerf was hard but fair, but nerfing vault as well was the wrong decision.

So even with the new code for vault, this skill is now worse then before.
And this is not Body Shot, Dancing Dagger or Needle Trap. Vault makes a whole build and the only alternative to d/p meta. I think u will lose thief players like this.

cmon anet get ur kitten together.. besides the quickness bug itself, any nerf to vault in addition to the endurance nerf (CV, SoA) disables a whole build people like alot atm.

babazhook.6805:

While I try and play all weapon styles as theif, I justy have a natural affinity for s/d. How are the recent boosts to the style affecting the performance in pvp?

The longer port gives it the engage potential of d/p and the rturn on infiltrators the disenegage on p/d. this should make it work much better and push to rivaling d/p not so?

S/Ds defense is too fragile. Any above average meta player is able to and will disable your playstyle now by easy rupts. The instacast on shadow return was op years ago, but due to massive progression on other meta builds this is no longer the case.

JonnyForgotten.4276:

But they would make more sense swapped. . . it’s something I would like to see. Doesn’t matter though. I play gingerbread man, so everyone hates my opinion

ye the venoms functionality is so bad, even if leeching venoms would be in DA u couldnt use one excpept basilisk in competitive play. the (oh so bad) condition thieves rely as i said above on defensive utilties as well, may leaving room for one single venom in profession skills but impairing daggers will always be the better option compared to any venom. so to me this is just a piece of bad work.

yes this trait composition is holding on to way earlier concepts of anets thief and are no qualified use for any kind of playstyle this way. with the progression of other classes, thieves rely more and more on their anyway poor defensives (bandits defense, shadowstep, bp, agility signet, …) leaving no room for effective use of venoms.
with this as a fact, theres no big attention to those traits sides devs i guess.

spam dodge and stealth do not require high skill

There are no skillfull builds, its the player who brings the skill. What u meant to ask is what thief build got the highest skill cap and it is clearly dp with bound. But as this is a meta system the question is irrelevant, since there is only 1 build per profession that sets the highest skillcap (metabuild). Sad, but true

blame the translator but i guess u catch my drift. restricting this to pvp only 1 is beautiful fast range aoe dmg. besides the condi/dmg from each skills they each serve good functions like blasts, instant evades, healing reduction and the superior form of movement: teleportation. the shortbow is no weapon to make the 1v1 but is gives u everything to survive and interfere.

your idea for death blossom reminds me of fist flurry. but if u really think one dubdagger would survive without an evade skill in pvp i guess u never rly tried one before.

this game is pve mainly. steady pvp players like u and me are left with therories and assumptions only.

thiefs shortbow skill set is the most elaborated in the game. there shoulnt change a single code and i dont believe it ever will. every single one of these 5 skills are pure gold in every possible thief build.

man tbh i alread abandoned all hope but u guys give me comfort. lets pray to dwayna i get my exploration gifts back! (or at least the motivation to keep going – its the only thing missing for my first legendary after 3983hrs of gw xD)

thank u thats interesting. i sent a request and hope for the best. seems like a similar case for me as i dont need back the whole charakter just the item.

ok ill give it a try but somehow i got a bad feeling about this

hi a friend of mine deleted a “bank char” from my account a while ago with my world completion gifts on it. is there any way to restore the deleted character with his stuff? i cant do this all over again

Korochun.5862:

they are literally dealing only two conditions – poison and bleed

the midsteal impdaggers + dodge in choking gas means cripple, torment, bleeding, slow, immob, weakness and 14 stacks of poison. everythin in less then a second. get your facts right.

emkelly.2371:

you should know that you can aim where you withdraw to

u dont kittening say

emkelly.2371:

not bad advice, but what about if they are using Withdraw?

unless he cancels his own heal withdraw will put the thief in a unfavorable position where u may profit from. tho hes losing heaps of offen- and defensive potential without CV cause its 85 endurance with more heal on less cd for the class who profits most from endurance. only the first pulse heals just as much as pulmory impact hurts u.

Honestly staff perma evade thief is worse in team fights. I have seen them so confident in their evades they go berserker and pop 6-9k vaults. It is also the passive acrobatics trait they buffed thief with. 50% hp 2 seconds of evade was bound to make perma evade thief toxic on power or condition.

vault hits hard but the chance is very low to hit above average opponents because its just too obvious. I dont think the instant reflexes makes sense in any kind of pvp build compared to pain response. Just like Panice Strike or Executioner u can easily anticipate the next moves.

heres my advice for the acro condi thieves if u need it.
He has his best chances in 1v1 onpoint. especially if hes the opener.
your chances are doubled if u fight him in an open area as he only has full potential in close range and keeps himself alive by evading. more: there is almost no stealth.

as meta necro, war and mesmer the key is to strike only if u need to or u are sure it hits (immob, cc). every evade by thief means cleans, heal, vigor and swift. also pain response triggers if u hit them. so basiclly, YOU are the one removing thiefs conditions.
then theres shadowstep but if u make the condithief use this in 1v1 it means u have good chances.

For meta Rev, Thief, scrapper and druid it is madatory to rupt channeled vigor and watch for the imp.daggers/steal/dodge burst as this means 7 conditions in 1 sec with more then 15k dmg through poison only. if u manage to block/dodge the burst the thief needs to act more offensive by using the dd autochain more often. this means less dodges for him and more rupts/bursts for u. to better your chances watch bandits defense 12sec cooldown. place your bursts in between and dont give them access to the reflexive strike (chain). dont think the strike wont hit because hes not in range. i like to use reflexive strike midsteal to set up my impairing daggers or an autochain.
with some practise u can rupt death blossoms pre- or aftercast. if u manage to keep rupting db the thief has no chance at all.

Pay close attention to your own conditions and care my advice now. Besides the single conditons effect (slow, immob, cripple,..) every condition the thief applys serves another purpose: so u dont remove poison but remove the others. poison is the main dmg source and i apply all the other conditons so u dont remove it. Heres an example:
If i do a simple imp.daggers/steal/dodge combo, then opposing thiefs shadowstep, mesmers cleanse or necros passive proc will cleanse some conditions, but most likely not poison. care ur timing so u clean especially this one.

talking about pvp, i wouldnt say the venom changes reduced d/ps viability. he even benefits a bit but then theres the backstab and immob arrow nerf. any kinds of changes to venoms except BV do not effect any kind of thief build because the capabilities to “viability” requires defensive utilties (bandits defense, blinding powder, agility signet, shadowstep) and leave no room for 40cd condis which are instantly removed or end up at pets, crates, clones and minions.

Shylock.4653:

Cobrakon.3108:

2. make traps work even if the person who used the traps is blind. It makes logical sense that if a trap is laid down then blindness is irrelevant. Either a person steps onto a trap or they dodge through it.

Buff???
That would be a big nerf to thiefs. Blinds are one of our best defenses and traps are mostly used by other classes against thiefs.

yea hahah he didnt quit think this thru. these thives player always think out their own perspective only =D yes the profession need some urgent mechanical changes but its not that simple as u want it to be.

yes its known since 26th patch but its not about the skill steal its about porting in general. i have witnessed this bug on shadowstep, infr arrow and steal as well so far.
in case of the non-targeting skills sstep and infr arrow u port to your current position and get the obstructed msg then (skill going on cd). in case of steal u port to ur target but without function or effect as u said.

Hi since the patch shadowstep sometimes ports the player to his own position instead of the targeted position, even on a clear view. pls fix soon its annoying since this skill isnt replaceble in pvp

it will take a while until anet will do this.. with all this huge engangement in living story pve they always miss some details

+1
it just looks like someone accidently swichted those traits out

whatcha gona do if the fullvenomstuffed thief hits u hard? if u run, my venomstuffed mates will give u the final touch!
ok jk, i made this topic to point out the difficulty of venoms and why they wont work.
see, the idea to adjust these damaging or functionatly effects to “the next few attacks” is good in theory. problem about this is “the next few attacks” are unlikely to hit the desired target as most of attacks hit more then 1 enemy. u apply your 40sec cd on clones, illusions, turrets, pets, minions or crates.
but this is no whining thread. ive seen some good ideas about this in the forums and thought at this point its good to point them out now that anet seem to put some attention to this. what are your thoughts?

Straegen.2938:

A nice “fix” to the issue would be to allow the chain to proceed between dodges/skills.

u can use skills and doge between the chain. for example:
if i fight a skilled thief i dont do uppercut right after impact strike hit. after impact strike i dodge (u can even hit with bound or IL), maybe bandits defense, fake-cast CnD so he dodge, THEN do the uppercut from a distant and stealport midcast so im sure it hits. u can do all of this and the chain wont cancel. same goes for finishing blow.
still asking for a fix?
But i tell you why there is no recast after hitting invul. state. Since the patch where u can dmg invul objects with leeching in wvw, hitting a invul object or enemy counts as hit. This is why the chain goes on cooldown when u hit invul.

this got nerfed awhile ago undercover. i was very annoyed at first too but u get used to it. there are 3 ways to use it: either u stompt instant, skipping downstate. then u can time the chain accordingly so finishing blow hits right after down’s invul. else u wait the invul out and use finishing blow instead of using it directly after uppercut. u got like 3 to 5 seconds between each chain skill to time your skill precicely. sorry for the english

Boot.7368:

And, realistically, how on earth would Anet people make ANY money (in order to keep the game going, of course) if everything was free? It is only natural that the ONE new traitline is stronger.

u are right in your way but u didnt fully get my comprimise. im not saying the elite specs or even the rest (unknown pve territory) should be provided for free. what im saying is that elice specs should be f2p in pvp only because, “realistically” the f2p player has no chance in participating competitive matches or even worse: get bored of this actualy brilliant game mode and just quit again. but 30bucks for the traitline only? i dont think so. wait, I DO, but newbies dont.
because, illustrated on my little example about my mates, heaps of ppl prefer pvp only and miss out the full potential of gw’s pvp. not even thinking about going pve before they see how much fun u can have in gw and all it has to offer.

Set.7461:

Deathrubber.3861:

dont forget about lotus training! what? op? nooooooo (;

I thought about that and I don’t think it would be op. That deathblossom/perma-evade build relies on Acr/Trk/DD. Acro to give perma vigor and Trk for the high initiative pool. By taking DA over Trk, sure you have lots of poison application but would it outweigh the initiative pool and caltrops on dodge? It will bump DA for sure but Trk is IMO the best core traitline on thief.

*Trk is IMO the best core traitline on METAthief. not the one we talk about. this goes off topic as its only about DA and DD but both are mandatory for high skill play (yes, even on condi). Trick WOULD be if u got the respective traits (toc, bounti & soh) but the caltrops and 5sec confusion are replaceble. as condi u dont rely too much on bountis boons (nice name for a band huh?)

its unlikly for big nerfs as it took alot of work to put the thief in his current state i guess.

its just impossible to inspire friends to play pvp. as im not playing any pve, they dont bother to try that (tho i think its easier to inspire to pve as u dont get offended, reported and smashed without hot). do not underestimate the differences between pve and pvp, alot of players do one of them categorically. i thought of this more like a win-win situation: as u only provide a full experience in pvp, anet wins way more players who want to experience pve/wvw too, buying hot. the current scheme expects them to start in pve what motivates them to buy hot but the scheme lacks pvp newies.

hey as i play pvp only i love the show the game to my mates and some of them tried it out. but after a while i realized there is practically no pvp without buying hot.
vanilla>no chance>no fun. so all of them stoped playing after a while (ofc, i wouldnt pay 40bucks for some traitlines for the new game). myself woulf even spend 100bucks for guild wars if its worth it just to thank u anet but new players wont.
i think its sad bc guild wars pvp is beautiful and i like to play it with my mates so why not make pvp fully provided? less money in the first place but way more players and money eventually.

what yall doing to the poor thieves xD

dont forget about lotus training! what? op? nooooooo (;

there are 2 base builds for the pvp condithief, first common one is the offensive version: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAoYVn8lCFNhdmCmOBkmilWCTLAcAWAelh2QKa+EuCfhA-TZxBQBepMAAOFAW4BAghjAgB3fAA
then theres the acro version with more sustain and mobility:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAoYVn8lCFmidmCmOBkmilWCrbx8E2CznwV4LULAcAWAA-TZxBQBGc/hGWGwCPAAAcKAwwRAAA

see what fits u best and test it in unranked

emkelly.2371:

Warriors and engies are the hardest
kills

assumed that the condithief and his opponents are skilled players, warriors and engis are definetly not the most difficult. try do take down skilled druids like frostball with this, its the hardest but doable. then theres engis and mesmer, both just take some time to tick down their hp. warriors and necros are pretty easy with some good dodges and condition management. revenant and thiefs have no real chance onpoint.
so warrior is very easy unlike auramancer or duid.

professions aren’t balanced, the metabuilds are. if there is only 1 (rarely two) build options, the rest is an illusion of choice. the traitsystem could be replaced by a selection of 2 possible build per profession and it would be the same. hurry with the pvp split as this monotony makes experienced players lose interest and new players struggle building up the interest.

Xtinct.7031:

sorry to say this man, but a “good” condition thief will destroy most ele/tempests. Especially if they know when to use head shot, if it is landed often, it is gg for the ele.

hahah real champs talking here

the acrocondi thief has his best chances in 1v1 onpoint. especially if hes the opener.
your chances are doubled if u fight him in an open area as he only has full potential in close range and keeps himself alive by evading. more: there is no stealth.

as meta necro, war and mesmer the key is to strike only if u need to or u are sure it hits (immob, cc). every evade by thief means cleans, heal, vigor and swift. also pain response triggers if u hit them. so basiclly, YOU are the one removing thiefs conditions.
then theres shadowstep but if u make the condithief use this in 1v1 it means u have good chances.

For meta Rev, Thief, scrapper and druid it is madatory to rupt channeled vigor and watch for the imp.daggers/steal/dodge burst as this means 7 conditions in 1 sec with more then 15k dmg through poison only. if u manage to block/dodge the burst the thief needs to act more offensive by using the dd autochain more often. this means less dodges for him and more rupts/bursts for u. to better your chances watch bandits defense 12sec cooldown. place your bursts in between and dont give them access to the reflexive strike (chain). dont think the strike wont hit because hes not in range. i like to use reflexive strike midsteal to set up my impairing daggers or an autochain.
with some practise u can rupt death blossoms pre- or aftercast. if u manage to keep rupting db the thief has no chance at all.

Pay close attention to your own conditions and care my advice now. Besides the single conditons effect (slow, immob, cripple,..) every condition the thief applys serves another purpose: so u dont remove poison but remove the others. poison is the main dmg source and i apply all the other conditons so u dont remove it. Heres an example:
If i do a simple imp.daggers/steal/dodge combo, then opposing thiefs shadowstep, mesmers cleanse or necros passive proc will cleanse some conditions, but most likely not poison. care ur timing so u clean especially this one.

TheNickPrice.8457:

potential for what…? feed pips? throw matches? look like a kitten? give the other team lol’s and receive thanks and praise, maybe tips for throwing match?

mate you clearly don’t know much of what your doing, given the skills/traits chosen for a pvp setting and amulet… and mentioning backstab potential with that amulet…

thats harsh but had to be said.. u are welcome to test any build in unranked plays but this will make ur team lose ranked pips if u have any skilled opponent.

if u run bound or impaling lotus just use it between ur uppercut and finishing blow to lose blindness. also escapist absolution can be used between the single chain skills if u run it. if not or theres no endurence (perish the thought!) u can either remove it with shadowstep midcast or agilty signet.

Koru.8574:

Impact.2780:

Time a skill for before they land, not after they land. Aim to hit the non-evade frame during the skill, not the gap between that and the next evade, which will almost always result in an “evaded!” PvP is awkward to learn in atm, because the skill gaps are so huge. You can reliably land something vs a class for days, then go against someone that is actually good at it and miss everything resulting in losing when normally you wouldn’t have done that, you’ve just been “trained to” by the bads.

…this is THE WORST advice i have ever read…to anyone who read his message, please ignore…contains more kittens than what i put in my toilet. The easiest way to counter is thru the use of auras, traps, pets or just sustain.

he’s not too wrong there mate. especially warriors and dp thiefs can time attacks to hit between evades and easy rupt death blossoms precast. dh traps and druids are helpful against them but dont counter them. there is no reason to mention auramancer as its like 2 rocks fighting each other.

impact strike isnt that difficult to land as its range is huge in close combat. its also direct, so it doesnt matter the direction ur facing as long as u focus the enemy. im not running dp but i still use it to rupt heals, set up a combo or sth. uppercut isnt hard to land either, mostly because u can cast it twice if it didnt hit the first time. same for finishing blow (except for downed invul.). theoretical, every skill from this chain could hit a different target. so if u see an enemy rez his mate, u jump in with (shadowstep or steal-)impact strike, stun him again with uppercut, switch your target to the downed one and stomp him using finishing blow.
u can steal midcast everything from this chain but i recommend to use it on the last two in case ur opponent uses stunbreaks or ports. most important: u got like 5seconds between the single chainskills, canceling on outgoing hit (except dodge!!!). use those seconds to land uppercut and finishing blow beneficial.

Orangensaft.7139:

catch them with CC walls like Hammer 5 Ring from guardian

If you cant hit your direct cc make them run or dodge into the CC themselves

that one second that they get knocked back from the wall has to be used to burst and if you can CC more

i wouldnt fight the condithief as a dh, especially with hammer. shortbow on condithief counters the dragonhunter in every way. u need to be VERY good and rupt him perfectly.

Ragion.2831:

Am i the only one that finds this incredibly hilarious. Grouch AKA Josh Davis at around this time last year said that thieves mindlessly dodge and announced that the studio will be killing evades. This made thief utterly useless till HoT release.

Just before HoT droppped Karl Mclain with such pride announced the daredevil spec which has even more evades thn what they destroyed thief for. The punchline is during a demo of the spec The Great Mclain literally used only one skill (death blossom) with lotus training to kill the chieftain.

So Anet complains about evades then destroys thieves.They then make evades permanent and make it extremely easy to apply pressure while evading.

Being able to pressure while evading is something that has always been limited, either you couldnt move while doing it or the attack damage was small, now we have cancerous d/d and staff thieves who just press one button to do amazing damage while permanently avoiding it

Lmao i tip my hat to these guys, great artists they have, but f#@kin confused class designers.

well thiefs concept as it was got useless as soon as others (more reliable) proffessions untertook the mobility, stealth and dmg. so with the elite spec there was another concept: fighting equals survival. and they implement this pretty well. cause as much knowledge u need to bring to stay alive, u need the same knowledge to kill the thief.

“what about those trickery/agilty signet thieves spamming only 3 and dodge? SKILL??” u ask? no, ofc not. but if he manages to stomp u without using impairing daggers, steal and autochain then ur at the same level as him.

the acrocondi thief has his best chances in 1v1 onpoint. especially if hes the opener.
your chances are doubled if u fight him in an open area as he only has full potential in close range and keeps himself alive by evading. more: there is no stealth.

as meta necro, war and mesmer the key is to strike only if u need to or u are sure it hits (immob, cc). every evade by thief means cleans, heal, vigor and swift. also pain response triggers if u hit them. so basiclly, YOU are the one removing thiefs conditions.
then theres shadowstep but if u make the condithief use this in 1v1 it means u have good chances.

For meta Rev, Thief, scrapper and druid it is madatory to rupt channeled vigor and watch for the imp.daggers/steal/dodge burst as this means 7 conditions in 1 sec with more then 10k dmg through poison only. if u manage to block/dodge the burst the thief needs to act more offensive by using the dd autochain more often. this means less dodges for him and more rupts/bursts for u. to better your chances watch bandits defense 12sec cooldown. place your bursts in between and dont give them access to the reflexive strike (chain). dont think the strike wont hit because hes not in range. i like to use reflexive strike midsteal to set up my impairing daggers or an autochain.

Pay close attention to your own conditions and care my advice now. Besides the single conditons effect (slow, immob, cripple,..) every condition the thief applys serves another purpose: so u dont remove poison but remove the others. poison is the main dmg source and i apply all the other conditons so u dont remove it. Heres an example:
If i do a simple imp.daggers/steal/dodge combo, then opposing thiefs shadowstep, mesmers cleanse or necros passive proc will cleanse some conditions, but most likely not poison. care ur timing so u clean especially this one.

i hope to help u out. im playing thief only since beta, started pvp about 2 years ago and play condithief for like a year.

assuming my condition thief in pvp, i noticed that almost all shown poison durations on skills are wrong. i extended the poison duration with venom sigil, thorns runes and potent poison trait by (20% + 45%)+33%. i know that the final effect exceeds 100% poison duration as the 33% from trait adds to the 165% instead of the 100% base duration. but in the end steal shows 22sec poison but its only 19sec. same for impairing daggers, shows 17 1/4 sec but its only 15sec. choking gas says 4 1/2sec but its only 3. please make the info accurate.