Guild Wars 2

Well… since I dislike the slow travelling speed on Cluster Bomb (CB) arrows, I try to get a bit closer to the target anyway. So /shrug to that range adjustment.

However – IF I want to close gap and use Short Bow (SB), I most likely try an Infiltrators Arrow (IA). With the adjustments made to IA Thieves lost at least 50% of the usable targets for IA and half of the other ones are so hard to hit exactly in the heat of the battle, that the skill fails.

So if I loose range AND the effectiveness of a movement skill – that’s really bad. Leave SB range at 900… no problem – but add 25% damage (*) and give IA a big push. That way SB Thieves can get to their targets if they want to, CB or swap weapons or else.

At the moment ranged classes can stand at certain places and dps their heart out while Thieves have to kinda walk up to them (please take CC skills into account). A few weeks ago I could IA to that places and start a fight – now I have to burn some good abilities including heal just to get there.

(*) :p

There is no agenda.

The Thief profession was designed to be different. The use of initiative instead of cooldowns shows that. Still most people look at the Thief from the point of view of THEIR characters/professions and simply argue in a way, that’s not valid for the Thief.

Instead of starting to think about class mechanics and doing the so-called “adjustments” in a way, that works in line with the Thief profession, A-net seems to be out of ideas and just nerfs abilities while hoping this will solve problems. It won’t.

I don’t mind having lower stealth as a Thief – but please do a partially re-work for the Thief abilities and skills instead of just nerf them. The original idea behind the Thief relies on certain parameters to work – and these parameters are in a bad shape at the moment. At first I was going to vote for a mixture of b) and e), but

I think it’s g) A-Net puts the Thief profession in second (wait… it’s more third actually… grrr) place and has no interest/plans to respond to reported “imbalances” in a creative/constructive way.

Possible solution:
- remove initiative and make the Thief class work like any other profession
- Example: CnD can be adjusted by fine-tuning the cooldown that way, making “perma-stealth” not possible
- also Heartseeker can’t be chained (yay – no more “endless easy-mode HS spam!” /rolleyes) etc.
- the standard A-Net profession team can think in “common” pattern and all players can argue about the Thief profession based on the same understanding of class mechanics

Of course this would remove the Thief profession completely as it was advertised and exists at the moment – which would be quite sad.

I’ll start with just a few ideas:

PICK LOCK
Works on everything that has a lock. Picklocks can be crafted and can have different qualities. Wouldn’t it be nice to picklock Black Lion chests (with a certain chance)? Maybe you could picklock a keep door that way?

PICKPOCKET
Why not steal some nice gold from monsters, NPC’s, whatever? I mean… you are a Thief afterall? Maybe steal some special things, too? Things, that can’t be looted otherwise?

CLIMB
Be able to climb (keep) walls at certain areas, steep mountains, even (some) trees (and hide in there for example).

DISGUISE
Blend with your surroundings. No stealth – you are still there. At a certain distance your armor color and pattern looks more and more like the surrounding (to a certain degree), your name tag is less visible etc.

DISARM ENEMY
Your stealing skills are so high – you can even disarm an enemy. Target can’t use weapon skills for a certain amount of time.

DISARM TRAP
You can detect and disarm all kind of traps – and maybe avoid some automatically.

MASTER ACROBAT
Some skills or skill improvements, that are related to acrobatics.
“Long Jump”: you jump further than others and can get to places others can’t reach (that easily). Can also work as a movement skill/gap closer.
“Master evade”: your evades cost less and last longer.

Many players seem to dislike the Thief as a profession right now. The class experienced many adjustments and nerfs since release.

After reading the “we need a break” thread (https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/We-need-a-break/) I am curious about your opinions on making a new Thief profession, that gets less hate and less “adjustments”.

For me it looks like A LOT of people asking for nerfs regarding the current Thief class and asked since the game started. And I too got the feeling, that A-Net blindly listens to these people.

So I guess the majority of the player base of GW2 would like to see the Thief being kinda changed and I wonder, what those people have in mind, if they are NOT just asking for nerfing Thieves even if they are already at the bottom of the food chain. So let’s think positive and assume, that there are some good ideas around.

My question is – what do people think about a solid, well-balanced, useful Thief class? Think in terms of a class description and tell us, what should make a Thief special, separates it from the other professions and makes it rewarding and fun to play.

To help you with that, I can tell you, what people DON’T want:
1) The Thief class shall not have burst damage.
Burst is a bad thing as it can kill other players too fast. All major burst skills have been nerfed for the Thief since the game was released.

OK – so a Thief shall not burst. Fine.

2) The Thief class shall not have strong condition damage
Thief has no access to burning anyway, so that leaves poison and bleed. Just Poison is laughable in terms of killing enemies and can be counted as an “annoyance”. So for condition damage the Thief got: bleeds. From last patchnotes: “Reduced duration from 15 seconds to 10 seconds”. Do I have to say more?

OK – no condition damage/burst from Thieves.

3) The Thief shall not go into stealth too often / too long
No need to elaborate on that… we all know it has been nerfed and is still one of the major things people ask for.

OK – stealth only as a special skill, that won’t last longer than a few moments.

4) The Thief shall not be able to run faster/escape easier than other classes
Let’s face it – if the Thief can’t win a fight he/she’s probably going to leg it out. People don’t want that. If a Thief dares to attack he/she shall PAY for it. Period. Look at other professions and how they got plenty of speed options. I am quite sure there will be some nerfs ahead to make sure, that (almost) every profession can catch a Thief so the “fair” fight can start.

OK – no special mobility/speed for the Thief.

…

Now it’s your turn – can someone please answer my question? I mean – either the Thief profession really brings something unique, rewarding and worth playing to the table or A-Net shall dump it right away.

Please describe a Thief class, that is worth having the name “Thief” and won’t get nerfed because of it’s abilities. Also think in terms like: “I like having a Thief in my team, because: …”. Obviously it is not easy to design that class, so let’s help A-Net with a few good ideas!

Maybe we can create a new and better Thief profession that way!

Regards

+1 to “we need a break”

I moved my question regarding a “better” Thief here:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/suggestions/Thief-v2/first#post1730535

Feel free to post your ideas!
*

Regards

@A-Net
Please fix the current lag issues. Playing 1280×800 with everything set to none/lowest/off and I still experience massive lag even in PvE areas with very low population (read: only me and a few mobs there).

You can’t actively play that way in the means, that you can’t avoid damage, can’t use your skills properly and so on.

Add in the culling issues —> it’s really terrible. C’mon – 5 years of development, an ultra-long beta-test and like 6 months after release we are talking about the basics here?

Sorry if that sounds a bit harsh, but it is really THAT BAD.

You can’t perma-spam skills as a Thief, because – you guessed it – you run out of initiative. Classes, that can really spam skills, are the ones, that got lots, like Elementalist and Engineer. Why? Because they can switch kits or attunements and have a “fresh” number of skills ready, which are not on cooldown.

Ok – you have to keep track on what skill you used up… ok.

So forget about that “222222” heartseeker nonsense already. Just stop spreading myths and lies if you can’t prove your words.

Oh… and if you really want to do the math… please keep in mind, that a good thief would not spend ALL initiative at once but keep some points for defensive actions.

My concerns?
I’ll start with the way people discuss Thief issues here. Not going into detail – you know, what I mean. Lets ban those vague rumors from a serious forum:

(1) Only speak for yourself
Who cares if your friend dislikes Thieves, died to them, left the game etc.? You heard other people saying something about Thieves, post silly screenshots etc.? Who cares? It’s only your(!) opinion, that matters. If you see 20k+ backstabs every 5s and thieves wiping whole groups while being 90% of the time stealthed… ok —> move on to (2)

(2) Prove it
Full length non-edited video(!) – or it didn’t happen. We want to see, what you saw, what you might have been able to see, what you might have been able to do etc. Of course even the video will not tell everything, but at least it’s better than nothing.

(2.1) For the real determined
Prove, that YOU can do, what a Thief did to you or your group and how easy it is. Same rules as in (2) apply.

(3) Language please
Keep it nice and friendly.

Why that suggestion? Well… I am not one of these pro players on our server and I know that. So from time to time I record video while I play and then watch it again to see, what was good, bad and – very important – to see all the little details I didn’t notice when I was playing. Many times I found, that I missed something and died to my own bad reaction, positioning, wasting of abilities and so on.

With those videos, detailed descriptions etc. we can separate myth and reality. Come on – let’s do it.

Kind regards,

Schnitter.9857:

You hardly will see someone stacking 10 bleeding using just auto attack.

actually I had to laugh at that…

Just continue playing… eventually you will run into these enemies, just wait and see!

I play a lot sPvP, mostly hot-joining matches, some tournaments. What I learned is, that there are a few players, that are just experts in what they do, this includes offensive (Guardian eating enemies alive) as well as defensive playstyle (Elementalist outlasting 2 Thieves and kill them in the end). As a more casual player I tend to die to these experts… including the good Thieves.

And I see many people in the forums complaining about the fact, that they were killed by another player. A player, that (maybe!) just was better than they. To all these people: I think there are some pro players on your server too. People that can counter every thief or at least stand a fair chance. Find those and learn from them. Part of the whole thing is the classes, granted. But there are many other things to take into account: player skill, the special situation, cooldowns, buffs/debuffs, pure luck etc.

If you really feel, a high burst glass-cannon Thief is godly in sPvP… roll one and play a while. Any good player will be hard to kill if you don’t have the right “counter-build”. You will loose against any pro player, regardless of the enemies profession. And you will notice, that Thieves are just different, not OP.

Playing your “nemesis” class on your own was always a good way to learn it’s weaknesses and problems and that holds true for GW2.

Just crying for a nerf killed many good MMORPG games and chances are high that this behaviour will kill GW2 too. Please stop it so we can enjoy the game for some time.

just my 2 cents

@ArenaNet
Maybe this has been asked before and I missed it… but how exactly do you find out about “necessary” changes? For me almost every patch destroyed a bit of the fun I had with my chosen profession(s) – I’d say I like 20% of the changes and hate 80% so far. So it’s kinda safe to say YOUR ideas are not what I think about those classes, balance, mechanics and stuff.

However – there might be good reasons behind the changes, but to me in the first place it looks like “someone said this and that skill is way too powerful (in damage, duration, utility, whatever) – please change that!” (or in short “xxx is OP —> Nerf!!!”). And you do it.

So… do you
(1) heavily analyze the log files and draw your conclusion from statistics on what classes are played when and for what, what skills they use, how often they die or kill other players etc? What are the key numbers you watch?
(2) browse forums (if so – which ones) and if just enough player ask for something you consider including it in a patch?
(3) actually play the game or have a couple of people playing the game (kind of a reference team to eliminate or “level” the “human” factor) and analyze those games and get recommendations from these people
(4) every of the game designer team just tries to come up with some “cool” ideas and if the team likes it… you include those in the patch (joking)
(5) do something else?

Please shed some light on this. When I can understand how and why you change classes in a certain way and what probably might be a “final” role/position in PvE, sPvP, WvW etc. it would be way easier for me to decide and stick on a certain class/build and learn to play that class in the way it was meant to be played.

This might be a personal thingie… so no offense meant. I am sure all the people, that are comfortable with playing flavour of the month classes/builds/playstyles depending on current patch status won’t have a problem at all… but that’s not me and not what I want from that game.

Kind regards,

With the Helloween patch shadow refuge changed the way it was stacking with other stealth effects for me. Some days ago I could easily get 21s stealth, now it’s down to 12s max.

I still have to test what you all wrote here, but so far the last patch is a huge(!) nerf to stealth for me. This or I miss something very basic.

Other ideas:

1. vital shot
   - make it a skill chain: 1st shot bleeds 5s, 2nd shot poisons, 3rd shot has decent (I said decent, not pathetic!) damage. That way you can stack 2 conditions on an enemy and traited 15pts in deadly arts you can weaken the opponent. The idea behind this is the thief loading it’s weapon with different ammo.
   - another idea: add a cripple/chill component (I mean: “vital shot” – that has to mean something other than a silly bleed, right?)

1. body shot
   - Shorten range to 600. Raise vulnerability duration to like 10s and add a CC component like 2s chill or a good knockback/knockdown. I mean – we are talking about a body shot, look at the symbol… the enemy is quite close, you aim at the chest and give a solid blow. Something SHOULD happen, right?

1. unload
   - Lower cost by 1 initiative, raise number of shots from 8 to 10 and increase firing speed a tad to compensate (10 shots in the timeframe of 8 ). Last two shots have 50% chance to cause burning for 2s each. (overheating effect of your pistols)

1. head shot
   - make it a 1s-1.5s channeling skill. A well aimed, 1200 range sniper attack towards the head. If it hits: 1s daze plus blindness (immediate effect of the headshot) plus 3s weaken afterwards. Add appropriate damage component for a headshot.

1. black powder
   lower initiative cost by 1. Raise combo field radius and duration by 25%..50%

Roll a thief with full dps build. Join tournaments against good(!) players. Make a full length video, where you show:
1. you survive most (if not all) fights where you choose to attack
2. you survive most (if not all) fights where you were attacked by another player or a group of enemies
3. you kill every enemy regardless of class and build in (what was it again?) 2s

You are talking about that here, aren’t you? So show us, please! If you can’t —> stop trolling, please.

50%+ of what you see in sPvP comes from the player and some moment of luck. If a thief is out of initiative, he’s 50% Moa’d already. The other 50% are a pathetic heal, 2-3 dodge rolls and auto-attack. Maybe a stealth ability on 48s CD. Think of it.

Thieves got stupid burst? Well… if you really believe that, roll one, make a full dps build and join tournaments. Two things will happen:

1. you will be able to kill some players which are new to the game, unaware of the combat situation, already low on health (add more reasons…) and even pump out some high damage numbers

2. you will die often to the more experienced players and will notice, that your “burst” is laughable compared to the ability-chains other classes can use. If you are out of initiative —> no burst. Think of it.

Just another “OP” thread. Move along… nothing to see here.

25k backstab. Pah. A few days ago I was hitting a bird in WvWvW for 70k… and I was not stealthed. So go back to the drawing board and try again.

On a more serious note: I never saw that happen in sPvP, not even a number close to that. But I saw silly numbers on 100B spam, killshot and volley on a regular base (just because your “enemy” was a warrior).

50%+ of what you see in sPvP is coming from the person playing the toon plus some element of luck anyway… so stop that OP crying for thieves already please.

Make a video where you show that number 10 times in a row on a heavy armor golem and then a video where you slaughter some good players over and over again in tournaments using that 2-key trick.

So you think thief is OP and you get easy kills? Roll one and try for your own. And I don’t mean killing newbies – play tournaments against decent teams.

You might be surprised how often you get killed or have to run away. Just try it and don’t troll here before you didn’t experience it on your own.