Purpose:
- To document all thief nerfs. This thread exists to inform mainly non-thief players who think we are developers “golden child” and never receive nerfs. I will be updating this thread each time a nerf occurs.
Important Notes
- Please keep in mind whether a change is deserved or undeserved plays no role in determining if it’s a nerf or not. I am not making the argument all of these changes were undeserved.
- This thread was re-created because I decided to remove a few things from the list that were causing controversy and pushing the thread off-topic.
- A bracketed note can be found next to the changes where there is a debate as to whether or not it is a indeed nerf. For example, the change to stealth in regards to NPC aggro tables.
- I will be updating this post each time a nerf occurs.
- I will not be including bug fixes as nerfs.
- Bullet points found in italics indicate that it is debatable whether or not something is a bug fix or a nerf. Without the patch notes explicitly stating, it can be difficult to determine if developers were fixing a bug, or realized something just needed balancing. If some evidence is presented it was indeed a bug, I will remove it from the list entirely.
List of Nerfs
14 September 2012
- Heartseeker: Reduced damage of the 100%-50% threshold by 20%.
October 7th 2012
- Pistol Whip: Reduced damage by 15%.
- Basilisk Venom: Stun breakers now work on this skill.
October 22, 2012
- Assassin’s Signet: This skill has been updated to grant 15% damage for 5 attacks rather than 50% damage for one attack. [Debatable if nerf]
- Ink Shot: This skill no longer allows players to shadowstep out of water.
- Whirling Axe: This skill has had evasion removed from the ability
November 15, 2012
- Dancing Dagger: This skill’s damage has been reduced by 50%.
- Shadowstep: This skill is temporarily disabled underwater to keep players from circumventing walls when using it.
- Tactical Strike: This skill’s daze duration has been reduced from 2 seconds to 1.5 seconds in PvP.
- Cluster Shot: This skill’s damage is reduced by 15% in PvP.
- Cloak and Dagger: This skill’s damage has been reduced by 33% in PvP only.
December 14, 2012
- Piercing Shot: This skill is no longer able to fire at enemies behind the player.
January 28, 2013
- Leeching Venoms: This trait no longer affects gadgets.
- Smoke Screen: This skill’s blinding pulse no longer follows the thief.
February 26, 2013
- Cloak and Dagger: The player can no longer use this ability stack stealth by attacking WvW walls.
- Using stealth no longer resets NPC aggression tables. [Debatable if nerf]
March 26, 2013
- Stealth: The duration of Revealed has been increased to 4 seconds when coming out of stealth via an attack.
- Caltrops: Reduced duration from 15 seconds to 10 seconds.
- Basilisk Venom skill: No longer immobilizes targets in addition to stunning them.
- Quickness: Reduced from 100% attack speed to 50%.
April 30, 2013
- Mug trait: Can no longer critically hit.
- Trick Shot skill: First arrow is no longer heat-seeking.
- Smoke Screen skill: No longer destroys unblockable missiles.
May 14, 2013
- WvW Stealth Disruptor Trap: Removes stealth from enemies and reveals them for 30 seconds, preventing stealth.
May 28, 2013
- Shadow Return skill: No longer has infinite range.
June 25, 2013
- Body Shot: Decreased the vulnerability duration to 3 seconds.
- Cluster Bomb: Decreased the range set from 1200 to 900
- Larcenous Strike: Increased the initiative cost to 2.
- Nine Tailed Strike: Increased the initiative cost from 3 to 5.
- Shadow Assault: Increased the initiative cost from 5 to 7.
- Shadow Return (Infiltrator Strike Toggle): This skill is no longer a stun breaker.
- Withdraw: The travel distance underwater has been cut in half to match the land distance.
- Lotus Poison: Can only apply once every 20 seconds per target.
July 9th, 2013
- Shadow Trap: This skill now has a maximum duration of 120 seconds.
October 5th, 2013
- “We’re looking at shaving the efficiency of Flanking Strike slightly, so that it now only removes 1 boon instead of 2.” – http://forum-en.guildwars2.com/forum/game/gw2/October-15th-balance-skills-updates-preview/first
(edited by Malkavian.3751)