Guild Wars 2

DS? Hm….

The stupid rangers will keep AA/RF you then die.

The smart rangers just barrrage/send pet in and wait out the stability/reflect and laugh at you. That or an 8k maul in the face.

Faeyd.5094:

DeceiverX.8361:

And just for laughs.

Challenge accepted. I win. I even did this without using utilities or food running a full signet use build. I went the whole minute and won the fight. If you can’t survive for 8s against a ranger, it’s L2P. We have so many dodges and repositions on shortbow it’s not even funny. This fight as P/D would have just been unfair.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TOjc-iiJVn4

P.S. Clutch venoms :P

Well you did say why you needed to HiS (condi clear) and you didn’t linger in the stealth mode but let me say the inevitable about the warrior… so bad…. so so bad.

When I’m on my ranger… any thief not in stealth is dead in WAY under 8s. All of them.

The warrior used shield block at 2% health? WTF?

Basically the thief in the video almost died to one of the worst warrior I have ever seen.

But hey, you have a prove a point some how albeit that was low.

hihey.1075:

Sifu.6527:

hihey.1075:

I think most of the thieves out there were really bad players who didn’t know how to play this class and just played thief due to Sizer’s popularity and easy build he was using.
Now that it’s a tad harder to be effective as a thief, most of these players have rerolled to other professions.

We’re talking about a $50K tournament. I don’t think a team will bring a “really bad players who didn’t know how to play this class.”

…and exactly because it’s a 50k tournament, a lot of people would sign up for it “just for trying, you never know”.
;)

…and exactly, thief isn’t even viable anymore or you would see thieves in the tournament. thanks for proving my point.

hihey.1075:

I think most of the thieves out there were really bad players who didn’t know how to play this class and just played thief due to Sizer’s popularity and easy build he was using.
Now that it’s a tad harder to be effective as a thief, most of these players have rerolled to other professions.

We’re talking about a $50K tournament. I don’t think a team will bring a “really bad players who didn’t know how to play this class.”

Been watching the EU TOL and I didn’t notice any team using a thief. I could be wrong. It was mostly warriors/ele/engi/necro. So, are we officially the worst class?

Prysin.8542:

Trybil.1567:

I used to like sPvP. Rank 39. Now I die almost instantly every fight I enter. I suppose if you are killing people instantly its “fun” for you, but frankly this isn’t a good change. PvP should entail strategy and fights that last more than a couple seconds.

Come on Anet, fix this – make it a fun game for everyone please.

so, following your definition of “fun”…. watching a regen ranger and medi guard duke it out for over an hour would be fun?

because i did that with a mediguard (was a private arena, so no time limit)…. IT WAS NOT FUN. It was stupid pride getting in our way. Guess what happened? 1 hour 12 minutes in, we shook hands and agreed NEVER to duel with those setups again.

If you die in less then 1 second to any glasscannon, be it ranger or backstab thief or KS warrior, you yourself is not good enough to counter these builds. Thus you yourself is “removing the fun”.

Do you think i enjoy rolling a glassbow ranger and pewpew people in 1 sec flat? No, its boring and i wish they would leave PvP so some real enemies could be queued up with me.

What i want as a glassbow LB/GS ranger is someone or something with 2 braincells, able to fight me head on and give me a run for my money. Yet you know what? Iv’e yet to find anyone.

My build has not changed, the damage output has NOT changed. It is absolutely the same. Sure i can deal more of my damage faster then before, but not more damage in one attack.
People haven’t realized, god knows how, that rangers could do this exact thing, FOR TWO YEARS ALREADY. They never bothered to take notice or even care. This is your own arrogance and ignorance that has come to bite you.

I did’t know ranger could shot RF within 1.25 secs while procing both fire and air sigils for the past two years. /shrug

I believe the best they could do was a 3.75 secs with QZ (not 100% sure; could be 2.5 secs). Your overall damage output has increase since it takes 2.5 secs less for RF to CD after using it. .

Elfindale.4836:

This ranger damage is not right.
half the casting time of rapid fire is wrong, you should have left it where it was.
now ranger virtually has no ramp up time.

I thought 30% of the ranger damage should be from the pet? The buff to the cast time is fine to me but it seems the damage is too high. If you compare it to another 2.5 secs channel 1,200 range attack, Warrior’s Volleg, the ranger’s RF does about 20-30% more damage.

When they reduced the cast time of RF from 5 to 2.5, they also increased the DPS by 38%. Before, you can use 2 RF within 18 secs (10 secs channel and 8 secs CD). Now, you can use 2 RF within 13 secs (5 secs channel and 8 secs CD). The DPS increase is about 38%.

It seems like to me we have a power creep that is not heathy for the game other than PvE.

Valin.6873:

Uhh.. help?
So I mainly play WvW.. but i love to roam around and use my daggers.. (i have Incinerator). But one of my most favorite combos to use is Burning Speed with Lightning Flash.. But out of the ten times I’ve used it 9 times it failed and teleported me back to my original starting spot. So.. does anyone know what happened to it?
Is it officially broken? :/

-Valin

Probably because of this:

•Burning Speed:
Burning Speed no longer generates fire fields if the character’s position does not change significantly (for example, rolling against a wall).

I don’t know what you guys did with the patch but every time I am in stealth, I can barely see my character. Box pixel is covering my character. Wtf is this?

ButterOfDeath.2873:

NinjaEd.3946:

Jayden Ennok.3687:

ButterOfDeath.2873:

Jayden Ennok.3687:

NinjaEd.3946:

A thief enjoying an RNG factor in their build? Who are you?!!

Seriously, how can anyone enjoy the random effect this trait produces? Thief needs quick decisions to pull of their bursts and stay alive, having a 1 in 5 chance to recharge your skill(s) is just awful. There needs to be a purpose to this trait other than “ooh, piece of candy”.

I used to think the same untill I tried the trait. This “piece of candy” is a lot more useful to me than 5% on dagger skills or similar traits, which are just boring. Quick decision making is exactly what Improvisation allows for, since it changes thief’s possibilities right away.

ButterOfDeath.2873:

Now, a 20% chance to reset all utility cooldowns is indeed really powerful, but useless 80% of the time.
Instead, having to build around improvisation will limit what utilities, healing and elite skills you can choose while making utility-specific traits much less useful.

Plus, now that you’ve seen i know what intended means, let me iterate that in much earlier stages of the game the thief would steal a bundle, not an extra ability.
In that enviroment, the trait would’ve been just right, right now not so much.

Thus, this is why i’m proposing possible solutions to make the trait interesting and useful, rather than a really situational trait that requires certain conditions to be met.

I doubt many of those who use this trait actually build around it. You don’t build around each of the traits you use either, just some of them.

If you take illusionary persona on the mesmer, i’m surely going to play shatter.
Sure it’ll improve any build, but i’d gladly build around it.

Apples and oranges.

You could compare more equivalent traits but ofc that wouldn’t help your argument much.

Perhaps thieves need to speed up their decision making skills if they think Improvisation is useless due to rng.

-snip-

The trait must work with all skills, not just the on cooldown ones, as otherwise it’d be terribly overpowered regardless of the ICD you put in.

Why?
suggestion one: reset 50% of one type cooldown out of your skill bar.
Every 20 seconds, halving all cooldowns is too much, be it all deception or all venoms.
Not even a grandmaster trait should allow this.

suggestion two+three: fully reset one skill type out of your skill bar.
Regardless of cooldown, that can be abused insanely hard, such as a super instakill venom build. (all venoms twice applied with two unloads…insane)

Suggestion four+five: double scorpion wire into a zerg…double shadow refuge… double shadowstep… it’s better to avoid i’m afraid.

That said, the skill MUST recharge a random utility or utility+heal skill regardless of cooldown or skill type… OR apply a really high flat cooldown reduction (for example: 40 seconds) to said skill.

That would be the ONLY way to don’t force an ICD (which is BAD!), while having the trait to be balanced.
To be noted is that this way the trait is mostly useful in emergency scenarios, while it’d be almost useless in offensive/upper hand scenarios, where the skill could otherwise be easily abused to chain powerful abilities together.

Please give me an example of how one could easibly abuse improvisation if it recharges one of a slotted utility.

I believe I missing a around 1,000 stats and I don’t know where they went. Can someone help me find them?

I have about 3.5K stats from my full set of celestial gears but when I wear a full set of anything else, I seem to be missing 1K in stats. Where did it go?

hihey.1075:

Sifu.6527:

messiah.1908:

+1 hihey

just dont use % rather seconds. lets see how long a mesmer can be stealth by skills rotation
1.prestige – 4 seconds + blind + burning+aegis+protection+regeneration
2.decoy – 4 seconds + breakstun+aegis+protection+regeneration
3.veil – 3-6 seconds (can be used twice)+aegis+protection+regeneration
4.mass invi – 6 seconds + aegis+protection+regeneration
5.Desperate Decoy – 4 seconds +aegis+protection+regeneration
and 1 again for 4 more seconds
so total of 30 seconds uptime for stealth while getting aegis+protection+regeneration as defense and getting few offense as blind and burning

and if he use blurring so he is invuln for 3 seconds and distortion for 3 seconds more
so 36 seconds up time (after 40 decoy is up again)

so to say 50% up time its really depends how long you fight the mesmer
if you fight him 1 min so yes 50% and even more with evade (like hihey mention)

so what have we learned from that (or what have i learned from it)
mesmer can attack you for 36 seconds without being seen at all or 44 seconds with 4 seconds to catch them between their clones.

again- mesmer CAN attack you from stealth without being REVEALED!!!

while we theives dont (or wont use it) have the ability to perma stealth that long unless all our utilities are SR (16 s) BP (4 s ) HiS (4 s ) (or use combos) which dont allow you to attack unless you want to get revealed

i try to burst the mesmer first to use his utilities earlier and than try to win the stealth contest by prolonging the fight above 40-60 seconds with cnd. if i manage to do that my odds getting better but so far 50%/50% for me (i dont have utilities to stealth thus only cnd so i must not miss). if i manage to do that and if the mesmer is smart he will disengage the fight or put lots of clones just to get more skills rdy to be used, thus i usually let them run

I would like to add a few things.

Veil is actually 3 secs and 4 secs traited.

Mesmer has easy access to vigor.

Decoy is not affected by reveal.

For a mesmer, your DPS somewhat stay static even when you’re in stealth for the full duration (the illusions do the work for you).

For a thief, you use stealth for DPS and the longer you stay in stealth, the lower your DPS.

PU vs SR – Thief gets roughly 300 health per sec in stealth which is about 1200 hp for a full SA thief. Mesmer gets about 0-1560 from regeneration for entering stealth. So basically, it is anywhere from 0%-130% of what thieves get from SR. However, they get protection on top of that. It’s RNG but I have always seen protection since if you get regen the minor trait gives you protection.

I knew about the Veil fact, that’s why the stealth uptime provided by Veil is higher than the one provided by mass invi in my calculations
Every mesmer has perma vigor.
The only way to take a PU mesmer down is through a really high condi spike. Every power based build is bound to lose to any decent PU mesmer – the only exception being a REALLY strong S/D thief with Lyssa runes.

PS: for the whiners, I use Ele for guild raids, Thief for WvW roaming and Mesmer for duels or sPvP: after I tried almost every possible build for Mesmer I was so utterly disgusted by how cheesy PU condi was that I will never use it again.

I had great success using S/D in WvW before the boon removal nerf. I could always take away their regen/protection. Now its /sadface.

Sifu.6527:

Sensotix.4106:

Some things for the end here:
I know that I have listed a lot of things and didn’t provide a solution for everything but the aim of this thread is to point out what is going wrong atm and to solve those problems I think Anet will find a lot of experienced players that will help find solutions for the problems because imo it is not a good idea if I tell Anet how to balance the Engineer for example if I don’t know everything about this class – what I would suggest here is sitting together with some really good/experienced engineer players and ask them what they think needs to be done and then sit together with good/experienced players of other classes and ask them what they think about the suggested engineer changes.

If I forgot anything I will add it to the thread later.

Writing this thread took me quite some time so I would appreciate constructive feedback and no offensive behavior in the comment section below. If you find any mistakes in this thread since English is not my mother language and I don’t really have the time to control everything I wrote three times you can keep them and eat a cookie.

What is your view on Phantasm Mesmer? Is it passive play? If so, do you think it needs a nerf so that the class may get buffs in other areas?

Hi Sensotix,

I was wondering if you had a chance to look over my comment? I would appreciate a response. Thanks.

messiah.1908:

+1 hihey

just dont use % rather seconds. lets see how long a mesmer can be stealth by skills rotation
1.prestige – 4 seconds + blind + burning+aegis+protection+regeneration
2.decoy – 4 seconds + breakstun+aegis+protection+regeneration
3.veil – 3-6 seconds (can be used twice)+aegis+protection+regeneration
4.mass invi – 6 seconds + aegis+protection+regeneration
5.Desperate Decoy – 4 seconds +aegis+protection+regeneration
and 1 again for 4 more seconds
so total of 30 seconds uptime for stealth while getting aegis+protection+regeneration as defense and getting few offense as blind and burning

and if he use blurring so he is invuln for 3 seconds and distortion for 3 seconds more
so 36 seconds up time (after 40 decoy is up again)

so to say 50% up time its really depends how long you fight the mesmer
if you fight him 1 min so yes 50% and even more with evade (like hihey mention)

so what have we learned from that (or what have i learned from it)
mesmer can attack you for 36 seconds without being seen at all or 44 seconds with 4 seconds to catch them between their clones.

again- mesmer CAN attack you from stealth without being REVEALED!!!

while we theives dont (or wont use it) have the ability to perma stealth that long unless all our utilities are SR (16 s) BP (4 s ) HiS (4 s ) (or use combos) which dont allow you to attack unless you want to get revealed

i try to burst the mesmer first to use his utilities earlier and than try to win the stealth contest by prolonging the fight above 40-60 seconds with cnd. if i manage to do that my odds getting better but so far 50%/50% for me (i dont have utilities to stealth thus only cnd so i must not miss). if i manage to do that and if the mesmer is smart he will disengage the fight or put lots of clones just to get more skills rdy to be used, thus i usually let them run

I would like to add a few things.

Veil is actually 3 secs and 4 secs traited.

Mesmer has easy access to vigor.

Decoy is not affected by reveal.

For a mesmer, your DPS somewhat stay static even when you’re in stealth for the full duration (the illusions do the work for you).

For a thief, you use stealth for DPS and the longer you stay in stealth, the lower your DPS.

PU vs SR – Thief gets roughly 300 health per sec in stealth which is about 1200 hp for a full SA thief. Mesmer gets about 0-1560 from regeneration for entering stealth. So basically, it is anywhere from 0%-130% of what thieves get from SR. However, they get protection on top of that. It’s RNG but I have always seen protection since if you get regen the minor trait gives you protection.

Sensotix.4106:

Some things for the end here:
I know that I have listed a lot of things and didn’t provide a solution for everything but the aim of this thread is to point out what is going wrong atm and to solve those problems I think Anet will find a lot of experienced players that will help find solutions for the problems because imo it is not a good idea if I tell Anet how to balance the Engineer for example if I don’t know everything about this class – what I would suggest here is sitting together with some really good/experienced engineer players and ask them what they think needs to be done and then sit together with good/experienced players of other classes and ask them what they think about the suggested engineer changes.

If I forgot anything I will add it to the thread later.

Writing this thread took me quite some time so I would appreciate constructive feedback and no offensive behavior in the comment section below. If you find any mistakes in this thread since English is not my mother language and I don’t really have the time to control everything I wrote three times you can keep them and eat a cookie.

What is your view on Phantasm Mesmer? Is it passive play? If so, do you think it needs a nerf so that the class may get buffs in other areas?

Did I miss something??? Why is my progress still not account wide?

Actually, I take that back.

This game isn’t based on risk/reward or counterplay. My new suggestion for CnD is even if you miss you still gain stealth.

Compare my suggestion to Mesmers. When a Mesmer summon a phantasm, even if the target has aegis, block, or dodge, the phantasm stills summons. Seems fair when I put it that way right?

Archaon.6245:

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

“…warrior hitting you while also hitting clone…” You mean the same clone that if it gets shattered it does cleave damage?..or the clone that if destroyed does cleave conditions?..enough said? Nice to highlight the warrior when mesmer/ranger/thief/guardian/ele can all do cleave damage as well.

Tip: Cleave only works if your all standing in melee range to the cleaver.

Shatter is an aoe skill like many others and it’s supposed to hit multiple targets…war autoattack isn’t and still hits aoe, and with cripple, immobilize, chill and kitten is a bit hard to get away in time, if you attack a clone you should hit the clone…not everything around too. At this point who need targets? Just spam to win…and this meta proves it. Skills supposed to be aoe like earthshaker are supposed to hit multiple targets, aswell as many others in other professions..but cleave on pretty much every single skill? Nonsense…and if noone can see the problem here no wonder why this pvp sux so much. Not even answering wars trying to defend their perma aoe spam…not worth the time..

I see your point and I agree but it will never change.

You see, cleave damage is in the game because of PvE. How else will people kill waves of mobs without cleave?

Zenith.7301:

Sifu.6527:

Hype.8032:

Asuka Shikinami.5462:

oZii.2864:

Zenith.7301:

Phent.9350:

PU build is good only for WvW roaming, in pvp it is troll build nothing more

Not even for roaming. Roaming classes need to be able to kill quickly before someone else interferes or the zerg arrives. PU mesmers kill slowly.

The spec is just a bunker survival spec. It’s hard for you to die, but you also won’t be killing much if the opponent wants to retreat.

PU mesmer can’t chase at all.

Dueling build fits better I think. We probably all seen it in WvW you know the lone mesmer sitting around ruins like he is afk waiting for people to engage him.

I just ignore them and chuckles when they are chasing you spamming winds of chaos like it’s gonna hit anybody moving.

I hate you Sin.

Hype.8032:

Funny how chaining 5+ stealth abilities in quick succession isn’t considered spamming stealth

Utility:
Decoy (40s CD)
Viel (90s CD)
Mass Invis (elite) (90s CD)

Weapon
Torch 4 (30/24s CD)

At most Mesmers have 4 stealth skills, which using all 4 means you blew your elite, two utility skill and have to have a torch equipped – which means the phantasm you take is pathetically weak. Also those utility skills won’t be back up for a long time. As this isn’t likely in phantasm builds, I can’t see people doing this unless they need to escape (which other classes can do without having to blow so much, hi GS warriors) or if they have 3 staff clones up and are trolling, which is easy to deal with.

The only addition is a trait which makes you stealth on 25% health, but taking that means your giving up something actually useful, also it suffers from the same problem as thieves Last Refuge (ie you can’t control it and can accidentally proc revealed).

Right, and with all those abilities to stealth you’re essentially making a phantasm, dodging once or twice, stealthing, and repeating. It is spamming stealth.. the whole point is to stay visible as little as possible. I’m not passing judgement on it being OP or UP but it’s a incredibly lame way to play. No worse than MM necros , stealth spam thieves, and spirit rangers but is it really much of a consolation to say you’re no worse than that garbage?

No, PU is different! Because uh, we use it solely for defense unlike the stealth spamming thieves! Psh, you know I have to stay in stealth for the full duration to get my aegis, 8-10 secs of protection, and regen.

Well…I could summon a phant and it doesn’t break stealth but so what! You think its fun running around a circle while your Iduelist and Izerker do the job for you?

You just don’t understand how hard it is sitting down while your AI does the work for you.

Also, you know how hard it is to cast a Phast behind you? It’s hard work. And if you block or dodge my phant , it goes on full CD! My phant has to wait a full 6 secs to attack again leaving me at a huge disadvantage.

So please L2Play.

The best part is this guy saying PU use izerker phantasms.

When I fart out aegis, protection, and regen, it really doesn’t matter what weapon set I use. I even use scepter in my power PU build!

Hype.8032:

Asuka Shikinami.5462:

oZii.2864:

Zenith.7301:

Phent.9350:

PU build is good only for WvW roaming, in pvp it is troll build nothing more

Not even for roaming. Roaming classes need to be able to kill quickly before someone else interferes or the zerg arrives. PU mesmers kill slowly.

The spec is just a bunker survival spec. It’s hard for you to die, but you also won’t be killing much if the opponent wants to retreat.

PU mesmer can’t chase at all.

Dueling build fits better I think. We probably all seen it in WvW you know the lone mesmer sitting around ruins like he is afk waiting for people to engage him.

I just ignore them and chuckles when they are chasing you spamming winds of chaos like it’s gonna hit anybody moving.

I hate you Sin.

Hype.8032:

Funny how chaining 5+ stealth abilities in quick succession isn’t considered spamming stealth

Utility:
Decoy (40s CD)
Viel (90s CD)
Mass Invis (elite) (90s CD)

Weapon
Torch 4 (30/24s CD)

At most Mesmers have 4 stealth skills, which using all 4 means you blew your elite, two utility skill and have to have a torch equipped – which means the phantasm you take is pathetically weak. Also those utility skills won’t be back up for a long time. As this isn’t likely in phantasm builds, I can’t see people doing this unless they need to escape (which other classes can do without having to blow so much, hi GS warriors) or if they have 3 staff clones up and are trolling, which is easy to deal with.

The only addition is a trait which makes you stealth on 25% health, but taking that means your giving up something actually useful, also it suffers from the same problem as thieves Last Refuge (ie you can’t control it and can accidentally proc revealed).

Right, and with all those abilities to stealth you’re essentially making a phantasm, dodging once or twice, stealthing, and repeating. It is spamming stealth.. the whole point is to stay visible as little as possible. I’m not passing judgement on it being OP or UP but it’s a incredibly lame way to play. No worse than MM necros , stealth spam thieves, and spirit rangers but is it really much of a consolation to say you’re no worse than that garbage?

No, PU is different! Because uh, we use it solely for defense unlike the stealth spamming thieves! Psh, you know I have to stay in stealth for the full duration to get my aegis, 8-10 secs of protection, and regen.

Well…I could summon a phant and it doesn’t break stealth but so what! You think its fun running around a circle while your Iduelist and Izerker do the job for you?

You just don’t understand how hard it is sitting down while your AI does the work for you.

Also, you know how hard it is to cast a Phast behind you? It’s hard work. And if you block or dodge my phant , it goes on full CD! My phant has to wait a full 6 secs to attack again leaving me at a huge disadvantage.

So please L2Play.

Cynz.9437:

Edit: how would you change CnD more reliable or d/d build rather more viable in tpvp?

CnD is pretty unreliable and pretty costy hence why d/d is barely ever used in pvp.

Suggestion: if CnD fails,
- return half of the costs
or
- return all costs but put CnD on short CD

basically kind of like warrior spells work.

Maybe also reduce CnD dmg but if the attack hits it provides a buff (for example aegis or stability or small heal or 1 condi removed etc.) for 1 sec.

Thoughts?

CnD is fine. The problems you mentioned are not valid. A good thief can land CnD just fine. The problem with D/D isn’t #1,2, &5 – the problem is #3 and some what #4.

Compare it D/P. You can use all skills on that set as it seems more complete with its damage, stealth, interupt, gap closer.

No a different note, I should’ve rolled an Asuran thief. That CnD graphic on the Asura is hard to tell.

Force.8632:

Hey Guys,

I Guild Wars 2 dying?

There is barely anyone playing PVE from what i am observing… Bosses, major events and other interactive mechanisms are basically empty, played GW2 for 3-4 hrs today, have only seen less than 10ppl around PVE. Is it because i am in a low lvl area? or is GW2 dying??

PS im lvl 24 in lvl 1-30 areas.

It has never been the same since i left GW2 a few months ago… So little ppl playing? There isn’t much fun now T_T where are all of the players???

The financial trend indicate so.

1Q 2013 sales were $13.2M
2Q 2013 sales were $10.2M
3Q 2013 sales were $8.8M

So roughly a 20% decrease quarter over quarter.

Remember, this report is sales not EBIT.

So…about this awesome roaming guild I keep hearing about from BG – Riot. I haven’t seen them much. At most, I saw one guy running with the pugs. Do they still roam? If yes, around what time and with how many? This is Mag second time facing BG, probably the last for this season so maybe they will come out and play.

Stop giving me blue balls!

deracs.1762:

1v1 to the death…… Mesmer
1v1 anything can happen……… thief

Pure opinion of course heh

This right here is the truth.

oZii.2864:

Zenith.7301:

Phent.9350:

PU build is good only for WvW roaming, in pvp it is troll build nothing more

Not even for roaming. Roaming classes need to be able to kill quickly before someone else interferes or the zerg arrives. PU mesmers kill slowly.

The spec is just a bunker survival spec. It’s hard for you to die, but you also won’t be killing much if the opponent wants to retreat.

PU mesmer can’t chase at all.

Dueling build fits better I think. We probably all seen it in WvW you know the lone mesmer sitting around ruins like he is afk waiting for people to engage him.

I just ignore them and chuckles when they are chasing you spamming winds of chaos like it’s gonna hit anybody moving.

Oh GF memsers don’t run PU in WvW? No wonder they just fall over dead.

Rangerdeity.5847:

Sifu.6527:

The funny thing is…a Warrior Berzerker stance will counter your two grandmaster traits. LOL…wait this isn’t funny.

if even one of those necros in the thiefs party are running a build similar to what i run on my necro http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQUQRBHRhG2IkWlemmoGDfiA6x7rlzieUshtMqCrD-jECBoiFRjmiIgUGRORqIasFOFRjVXDT5iIq2grIa1SBwuuK-w i DARE the warrior to take an offensive stance and once his stance is over and the thief reapplies venoms if that warrior is even still standing he will be roflstomped that second wave of venoms is what will really make the build not the first impact

Err…where did I mention a necro in my post…

TheJokester.4672:

babazhook.6805:

5 thieves that hide when they can be beaten by a greater group coming out to flip a camp or ganking smaller groups?

How on earth is this an exploit? Is 5 engineers using grenades and stacking conditions on a target an exploit? Is 5 hammer warriors using the hammer train tactic wherein the enemy in perma stun an exploit? is 5 necroes taking turns casting signet of spite and epidemic an exploit? What of thoe AOE fields cast by 5 elementalists? What of five mesmers using perplexity and clones? 5 warriors rotating using heal on their shouts?

Why is it that thieves are always held to a different standard?

The fact is when ANY class works in conjunction in this manner the dynamics of the game change and the group will be seen as overpowered. It not limited to thieves ambushing. The only difference is the thief can hide but that same thief can not stand in the open like a necro can or a warrior can and expect to survive.

I don’t like your defense of the thief yes the other classes all together 5 v 5 would be devastating but take 5 thieves vs 5 of anything else and they win unless there is MASS aoe or the thieves stack together and get insta downed by a group cleave attack/burst aoe skill that is if you aren’t dropping smoke fields that blind consistently making them really only easily destroyed by mass aoe that doesnt require contact with a weapon

There was a tourney in spvp where it was 5 of each class vs 5 of another class.
Thief did good but I believe Warriors won.

The funny thing is…a Warrior Berzerker stance will counter your two grandmaster traits. LOL…wait this isn’t funny.

VOLKON.1290:

JMar.3254:

VOLKON.1290:

The “progress” that was made by the over-30 crowd was made in content that will be obsoleted. Now, if they gave a nice little title, maybe some personal exclusive clothing or the like for those crowd, hey, I’m all for that. Recognition never hurts. But regardless, what you progressed in is going away. There’s a new progression with different challenges and maybe even different skills and capabilities, we don’t know. New progression, new path, everyone gets on the path together. Everyone has a reasonable means to access the path by starting at 30 instead of higher up.

Right, they are deleting content and progression that they made the players believe would stay there by promising unlimited levels. But you’re okay with that, because I assume you are under level 30 fractals. You can clarify if I’m incorrect.

I’m willing to admit that I’m sitting at 28 or 29, I forget… WvW takes most of my time these days. But these changes starting at 30? Hell yeah that’s enticing be back to Fractals. I always enjoyed them, but so many bad guys to kill… but regardless, I wouldn’t have an issue personally if I were higher and it was being reset (or say they were resetting it to 20) because I know that’s putting me on a different, more challenging path of progression. I don’t “lose” anything. I get a fresh start with fresh, juicy stuff. I mean, can’t you just feel that cold, juicy, sweet Mistlock Instability dribbling down your chin? Yeah… Daddy gonna get some of dat. That’s the main reason the reset to 30 doesn’t and wouldn’t bother me. It’s to access a different path of progression. I don’t know how many people are sitting at level 49 and spend day after day doing the level 48 daily but let’s be honest… the progression there is done. Dead. Same old same old. Sure, you do the same old better than most, very nice indeed. But now there will be actual progression to be had that differs from what we’ve seen so far. And, more importantly, that new progression will be available to large wads of people rather than isolated among a select few.

I guess you don’t play FotM very much or really care didn’t care about it until now but progression did not end at lvl 48. In terms of a fixed number then yes, 48 is still 48. However, lvl 48 FotM provided the best chance of reward in terms of Skins, rings, rares that further help your progression in terms of gears and skin collections. They are now taking that away so starting at lvl 30, you have a reduced chance of getting those items.

For WvW, would you be ok if everytime they added new WvW abilities, Anet reset everyone’s WvW back down to 1? Just asking….

I gave it some more thoughts and I’m suggesting the following.

Player will retain their FotM LvL, however, they have to re-unlock it by going through the tier at least one more time.

Example: Player with LvL 50 Fotm

This player will need to do lvl 30 but once completed it will unlock 31, 32…40. That mean they can skip all the way to lvl 40. They will then need to do lvl 40 to skip to lvl 50.

Why don’t they just start the new content at lvl 50 and call it a day?

Regarding 50+, they knew about it for the longest time but didn’t care to patch/stop it because it was $$$ spent on Gems. Therefore, I would say it is intended.

Korsbaek.9803:

i would argue take 20% maybe more off the damage in stealth
make the reveald last 6 or 9 seconeds( when reveald where 4 sec people complained that the rotation where wrong and 3 fit very well but if 3 fits then 6 fits to just takes dubble the amount of time to get acces to stealth agien)
buff there damage outside stealth with 10-15%(with a nerf to heartseeker tho but not damage wise)

reworke the smoke + leap combo to grant blind when hitting a target instead of stealth

and make stealth grant reveald each time you exit it(also if its because time is up tho then a half reveald time could be ok)

I like this idea but lets take it one step further. Lets increase everything by 3 times!

Thief – Reveal is now 9 sec
Ele – Attunement swap is now 45 secs base
Guardian – Increase all F abilities by 3 times
Engi – Toolkits are now on a 9 sec CD
Mesmer – 9 sec internal CD on making illusions, reveal increase to 9 sec
Warrior – 30 secs burst skill
Ranger – Have to wait 3 minutes after a pet dies. 30 secs Pet swap
Necro – DS is now 30 secs

Takato.4976:

Wow….. WHY ? Why are immobilizes interrupts ?
This actually blows my mind right now.

@ google, legit anything really. Engies/necros/guards/Warriors, basically every class has an immobilize and the second you try to run away you get nuked with them. Immobilize should NOT interrupt your action, this makes it incredibly stronger than it has to be. ( considering it stacks now )

Yeah…I didn’t know this either. I always thought my character acted funny when I get immob but I just considered it “lag” since you do not see the interrupt message.

So, to be clear, the full potential of immobilize are:

-root target in place for X duration
-interrupt current action
-bypass stability

Can someone from Anet confirm this? Thanks.

Omnitek.3876:

Excalibur.9748:

Omnitek.3876:

Excalibur.9748:

Omnitek.3876:

Excalibur.9748:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Both Guardian and Ele have great healing abilities and Thieves have….um, have…, kittens, I’m drawing a blank here.

guardians and eles have access to almost perma protection and vastly superior healing.

thief has stealth…and evades. both getting nurfed next patch. we’re fast becoming irrelevant.

Stealth isnt being nerfed Mr. Doom and Gloom. Relax and let’s see how it plays out first.

stealth isn’t being nerfed, but one of the best stealth traits is being nerfed (infusion of shadows) so it’s practically the same thing.

it’s nice that you remain optimistic but can’t blame me for being cynical since we get nerfed every patch with no buff in sight.

I guess, coming from other classes, to thief, I see thing wayyyyy differently still, even though I main thief now.

I dont use the trait. The flat ini change is a buff for me.

even if you don’t use it, it’s still a nerf to stealth since it’s considered one of the best traits to stealth. If no one used that trait then you could argue it’s inconsequential but it’s widely used.

What you’re saying is basically like me claiming warrior didn’t get nerfed since I didn’t use unsuspecting foe or hammer. Just because I didn’t use them doesn’t mean warrior didn’t get nerfed slightly.

The only way you could stand to get somehow buffed by this patch is if you use D/D or P/D (or glass cannon D/P) and even then I wouldn’t consider it a buff more like a rebalance. Once again, even if the nerfs didn’t affect you personally doesn’t mean they didnt’ happen.

Normalization is not a Nerf imo. Why should spending currency (initiative) reward you with more?

What other class gets that ability?
Using stealth on my mesmer Doesnt increase the frequency of abilities I can use does it? Or dragons tooth by an ele Doesnt make it cool down quicker.

Using a skill doesn’t and shouldn’t reward you the ability to use it again faster.

GW2 plays a risk vs reward to a minor extent. Using combos to effectively eliminate all risk and only reap rewards is a broken concept.

If they removed leap finisher from HS and left infusion I would be happy. Would you? Be honest.

All this doom and gloom has happened time after time, for all classes. Mug can’t crit? Thief is useless! Lower BS damage? End of the world! And here we are again, listening to all the D/P act like the spec was balanced and they are shocked and blindsided by this change….

“Using a skill doesn’t and shouldn’t reward you the ability to use it again faster. "

Ele RTL – Hit target and you can can use it again faster.
Ele Fresh Air – Crit and you can go into Air again (if outside of it)
Warrior – Burst Skill Return Adren
Mesmer – Signet recharges all of your shatters

Just some examples since you asked.

Charak.9761:

just leave FA and SBI and YB to fight each other for the next 4 weeks, everyone already knows what servers will pull ahead and we’re not even half way through the season. Its not like there is going to be a difference and it doesn’t need a reason to leave these stacked servers stomping everyone else.

Obviously, your server just suck at WvW. Look, the Dev already said a rank 12 server have a chance vs a rank 6 server. So, I don’t know what you or your server are doing wrong. Maybe it is a learn to play issue. Pick up your balls and get out there and feed bags….errr I mean fight.

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

JinDaVikk.7291:

ok listen up cause most of this thread is a lie.

Engi does have perma vigor/swiftness.
Regen is not permanent in every build! We can get perma regen through dwyana runes. This hurts mosts builds though.
Protection isn’t permanent. We have nearly permanent protection if we are being CC’d repeatedly. We also have 3s every 20s if we trait for it.
Elixir B trait is 90s icd.

HGH engi has perma might, swiftness,vigor. Only access to protection is from RNG on the heal. 1/3 chance. If they get on CC means they have higher cd’s or no condi removal.

Engis aren’t god mode but we do have nice access to boons. Quit your complaining and get your facts right.

TLDR:
Elixir b= fury swiftness might retal for 10s (13 for boon duration). 32s cd when traited.
elixir h= RNG 1/3 prot, vigor,regen(10s prot is 5s). 20s cd when traited.
protection inject=3s prot on 5s cd if cc’d.
on critical hit 3s prot 20scd.
perma vigor/swift (being nerfed dec 10th)

So with your own words;
perma vigor/swiftness
perma regen on some builds
perma protection if getting stunned/cc’ed
access to high up time might

I never said they were god mode. I did say I can respect good play rewarding players being able to pull back from near defeat.

I did say are the boons getting out of control?..look at what you’ve just said about them..seriously, look at the statics you’ve just stated.

The point being made here is that i respect there is no passive and every boon must be activated. But as stated by others, running in circles dropping nades/bombs with 98% regen/ 50% swiftness/100% vigor/ 40% might/ with activated protection on CC/30% retail/30% fury…it may not be god mode, but perhaps Jesus mode.

Please state any other profession that can stack this many boons for these duration’s and rinse-repeat them with as many low cool downs.

it is one thing to call others liars, and then go and give facts about how many boons they can keep at near 100% up time.

I wouldn’t say 100% uptime but PU mesmer can get high uptime on Aegis, Regen, Protection, and Vigor while running around farting clones and applies conditions (not to the extent of an Engi bomb/nades) while their 1.5K HP phantasms do 2-4K damage and multiple stack of bleeds. You get the idea. The only thing keeping this build at bay is…condition meta and you can’t decap/cap points in stealth.

Arikyali.5804:

Gwalchgwn.1659:

He knew that part, read his last line first paragraph: But… I got stomped

You mean ‘she’.

The zerg was still a moderately safe distance away. If they were closer, I’d just try to flee without risking waiting for refuge, cross my fingers and hope I get away. The head of the zerg just sorta…leaped for me and I got immobilized. (Or stunned. I dunno, I just couldn’t move)

I think this is what happened.

You used Shadow Refuge but you got downed due to random attacks and AOEs. As a habit, you probably used number 2 to teleport but with Shadow Refuge still being up, you got revealed. Since you’re down, you cant see if you have the debuff or not.

JonPeters.5630:

Sondergaard.8469:

JonPeters.5630:

Infiltrator’s Return
The thing I have heard the second most discussion regarding. This is a big change to this skill, but we beleive it is a necessary one. In many cases this is not going to matter. There are only 2 situations where this is a truly impactful change.
1) It stops you from using this skill while stunned, which puts more burden on Sword/Dagger thieves saving their stun breakers. This is the kind of gameplay we want to encourage because it puts more risk in using a rewarding skill like Infiltrator’s Strike.
2) Mostly in PvP, this skill can no longer be used by S/D thieves to teleport stomp someone. This is actually the more impactful moment as it occurs more often, but I think it puts the burden on these players to run a second weapon set that can help them in these situations (OH pistol for instance.)

No, no, no, and no. The reason I absolutely am 100% against this change is the entire thief class is built around the idea that abilities are instant with no cast time with no cooldown (on weapon skills), because they are the only class with a resource pool for their abilities. Make it cost more initiative or give a debuff that slows down initiative gain. Reduce the damage, change the range, etc etc… I don’t care about that. What bothers me is the adding a cast time to a class who’s core mechanic is all about no cooldowns and being able to quickly maneuver around.

I’m not sure what you mean by instant, but this is currently the only instant weapon ability. We are not adding a HUGE cast time to this skill. This skill is going to have a 360 millisecond cast time. ~1/3 of a second.

Jon

How can you say that? There are other instant weapon abilities:

Just to name a few:

Mesmer:
Staff 2 Phase Retreat
Torch 4

Ele:
Staff Earth 4 Magnetic Aura
Scepter Air 2 and 3 Lightning Strike and Blinding Flash
Dagger Water 4 Frost Armor
Dagger Air 3 Shocking Aura
Focus Earth 4 and 5

…..

This is what he said:

“This is great feedback. One thing I will tell you is that now your build has 33% more initiative than it used to. This will gain you back that lost survivability and then some IMO.”

Jon,

How about this, don’t increase the base init regen from .75/sec to 1/sec. Just give 4 more base init for a total of 16 base init and keep the regen at .75/sec. By your own definition, that would translate to 33% more initiative.

I would rather have that than the 1/sec init regen.

Thanks,

Frenk.5917:

Bazzoong.7145:

I can permastealth with d/d without CnD…

I’m sorry sir, but could you please enlight me about how can you do that?

Smoke Screen + HS = 15 secs of stealth
Then use blindin powder or health for more stealth
Then use Shadow Refuge
By this time smoke screen should be off cooldown and repeat the above

DanielGames.5198:

WhiteRose.6934:

And lastly, the ‘nerfs’ that are going to happen, just get over it. Adapt, get better as a player. Maybe you’ll realize you weren’t as great of a thief as you thought when you can’t stealth at every whim.

“I am extremely skilled. I used to beat everyone, now I can’t beat anyone. If this class isn’t broken how am I losing to noobs? Did I get worse!?!” – Rogue

“No, you were never any good” – Mute

Seriously. After the announcement of the December patch, the thief forums have reminded me of vanilla wow when rogues got balance changes and required more than 2 buttons to kill anyone. The forums were flooded with players saying that rogues were now the worst class. There were 100s of threads with 100s of circlejerking replies all QQing about the same thing. It’s not THAT bad here but I’m seeing multiple threads all with the same topics with plenty of angry replies saying the same thing. I saw some quality topics in the thief forum but they quickly went to page 3 after the patch announcement.

Yes, the Sword #2 and vigor nerfs will hurt. However, I will adapt. Nothing is going to stop me from playing my thief the way I want. It’s not like thieves are the only profession that’s getting nerfed. The warrior nerf on their mace burst is going to help me a ton in pvp.

Part of being a good player is knowing what is powerful and what is not. The same reason you max and min stats to get the best out of the class. If a certain spec allows you to take 1vX, then exploit and ride it out for as long as you can.

The people that never used it are either too stubborn or didn’t know how strong D/P is/was.

The same kitten reason they nerf CnD+Mug+BS combo. Noobs can’t counter it.

The same kitten reason they buff the hell out of Warriors. So it is noob friendly.

Alright, how about we play this out in a duel.

Necro start with some auto attacks and or marks.
Ele LF + Earthquake
Necro dodge thus mitigate CC and Damage
Ele Switch to Water and is now at full health again
Ele uses Cone of Cold
Necro keeps auto attacking
Ele is now at 91% health but uses Cleansing Wave
Ele is now at full health again
Ele switch to fire and BS/ROF/Fire Grab
Necro is now forced to heal and still low on Life Force
Ele switch to air and RTL or updraft for CC and auto attack damage
Necro auto attack
Ele still not below 90% health due to regeneration from previous attune swap to water
Ele switch back to water or earth for some more damage
Ele is still at full health
….
….
….
Dead Necro

You get the point. Just play the fight out in your head vs a D/D ele

phys.7689:

Sifu.6527:

JonPeters.5630:

I said it in he other thread but this trait has to get hit hard because it is breaking the profession. We need to push the effectiveness of this trait into base thief functionality. If any other profession had a trait that reduced weapon cooldown by 30% for all weapons as a 15 point minor we would have to balance around that. A single trait shouldn’t be holding thief balance hostage so we will steal from this trait, no pun intended, and impart the savings on to every build via base initiative regeneration.

Jon

What?!?

I don’t understand Jon. You’re saying a 15 point minor that reduces cooldown on all weapon set is OP yet you moved Mesmer’s Illusionists Celerity from a 25 minor to a 15 minor (reducing all cooldown of illusion summon skill by 20% which affect all weapon sets and 4 utilties). That is kittenING OP but nothing is being done to balance around it.

I don’t understand your logic……

to be honest, its not quite as hax, first of all only two skills per weapon set summon illusions, second of all its only 20% instead of 30%. The truth is, it was in fact a trait that you almost had to take, illusion skill, not so much. its nice, but ehhh. Also if they lowered all cast times on illusions, and bumped the trait down, so that it was essentially the same cast time, no one would complain. And by the numbers, they essentially did that with opportunist. its not really .3 ini per second unless you are very lucky, and during specific skills, due to cast time, and crit chance.

the truth is that the ini changes are probably better overall.

HOWEVER, i think opportunist could use some other benefit, that rewards pressure attacks as opposed to stealth or dodging for extended periods

If you want to get technical with me, Mesmer’s S/S has 3 summon illusion skills so not all sets are limited to a max of 2 summon skills. Your comment regarding opportunist being a “must have” trait is subjective.

Again, I nevered complained about the opportunist nerf. I just questioned his “excuse” or “analogy” behind the nerf.

JonPeters.5630:

I said it in he other thread but this trait has to get hit hard because it is breaking the profession. We need to push the effectiveness of this trait into base thief functionality. If any other profession had a trait that reduced weapon cooldown by 30% for all weapons as a 15 point minor we would have to balance around that. A single trait shouldn’t be holding thief balance hostage so we will steal from this trait, no pun intended, and impart the savings on to every build via base initiative regeneration.

Jon

What?!?

I don’t understand Jon. You’re saying a 15 point minor that reduces cooldown on all weapon set is OP yet you moved Mesmer’s Illusionists Celerity from a 25 minor to a 15 minor (reducing all cooldown of illusion summon skill by 20% which affect all weapon sets and 4 utilties). That is kittenING OP but nothing is being done to balance around it.

I don’t understand your logic……

Whenever I fight a Mesmer, it seems like my first instinct is to dodge their phantasm summon. Then, I realized no matter how good I am at dodging, the phantasm will always summon. This is something that I feel is unbalanced and I hope Anet review this. All other skills in the game that is not ground targeted will be put on full cooldown if dodged. Can someone please explain to me why the Mesmer class gets to avoid the basic combat mechanics in the game? And what are the counters (I already know blinds and invul) but what else?

Thanks,

evilapprentice.6379:

Pawstruck.9708:

Just to clarify: Are you here just to drop the giant bomb on us and then leave, or are you guys actually looking for feedback here?

I don’t want to waste a lot of time trying to talk to people who aren’t listening.

Lets be fair – they have 8 classes worth of discussion to monitor. This post was just made today, it isn’t unreasonable to give them at minimum a few days to get back to us – the patch is still over a month away, we have time.

Hm…I don’t know. Jon already said “thanks for the feedback everyone, we will close this thread by the end of the week” on the generald forum so I have a feeling he’s not coming back.

I honestly believe this is what is going on.

Behind every change/patch, there is a greater motive. In last 6 months, patches have been focus on bringing the warrior/necro up so that they see high tpvp play. It is their time to shine. Since you can only bring 5 players in a Tpvp, someone has to sit out. Basically, they nerf one or two classes to the ground so those classes sit out of the meta for a while. They are trying to bring Ele into the meta again and I guess in the coming months the thief will have to sit out.

It is a vicious cycle but in the end they are trying to give each class a chance to shine in Tpvp. Is this right? It depends on who you ask…

JonPeters.5630:

I

Infiltrator’s Return
The thing I have heard the second most discussion regarding. This is a big change to this skill, but we beleive it is a necessary one. In many cases this is not going to matter. There are only 2 situations where this is a truly impactful change.
2) Mostly in PvP, this skill can no longer be used by S/D thieves to teleport stomp someone. This is actually the more impactful moment as it occurs more often, but I think it puts the burden on these players to run a second weapon set that can help them in these situations (OH pistol for instance.)

Jon,

Can you elaborate on this? Are you talking about Thief Sword 2 or our utility skill, Shadow Step? If you’re talking about Sword 2, can you go into details about why you think using 5 initiatives and a utility skill to secure a stomp is over the top?

Thanks,

By the way, can you change Shadow Protector to give us Aegis/Regen/Protect? This will increase stealth build substain.

Thanks.