Guild Wars 2

(WvW/Dueling perspective).
I agree with you ‘knyy’, ‘Dioxin’ I also agree that shadow arts is flows really nicely into DE. I think given enough time though, should people want to run DE and Shadow arts, they’ll end up having to run trickery for their third trait line. In fact, most decent DE’s that were roaming were running DE/SA/TR.

It would be nice to move away from it.

In competitive dueling or in WvW scenarios, the initiative is so important, it is the difference between using an ability — and therefore being able to deal damage and use the utility attached to a skill — or not. One kneel followed by a three round burst will have you completely initiative starved..now say that three round burst was dodged… you don’t have much left but to retreat or needlessly burn utility skill. You need to have a bit more in your pocket to do fight toe to toe.

Having the extra 3 initiative makes all the difference for flow; it needs to be baseline.

Furthermore, having the daze on steal isn’t very important anymore given the way DE’s steal/mark functions. For often than not, you’ll mark your target straight away before going into attack — it doesn’t mean anything that you daze them when you mark them. Who cares if we lose it? It’s not used as a clutch interrupt anymore, and without pulmonary impact you won’t be getting rewarded for interrupting anyway. And if you’re running shadow arts, and you’re stealth and you mark them, it just lets them know you’re about to open on them haha.. it’s so stupid.

Most thieves are running trickery for the extra 3 initiative.

Speaking from a WvW perspective…

Rifle — compared to any other weapon set — is extremely initiative hungry. The skills for the rifle aren’t too bad, but considering that every competitive build over the past 4 years has required trickery for the extra initiative, it’s definitely as this title states: the-elephant-in-the-room. God it would be nice to move away from it..

Moreover, trickery has the traitline “trickster” reducing the cooldown of ‘tricks’ and applying a condition removal. Considering that withdraw (which is a trick) seems to be the default heal for deadeye rifle (because of the synergy with kneel) and because INITIATIVE is such a problem, it makes sense to run roll for initiative (which is also a trick) because of its synergy with kneel again.. and the break stun is nice since we are losing bandit’s defence. So as many will appreciate, no matter how you look at it, you’re funneled into using trickery.

A lot of the little quality of life changes ‘thief mains’ have been asking for via feedback would be ameliorated if we could move away from the trickery line. If the traitline preparedness (three extra initiative) was made baseline, then people would feel more comfortable not having to run trickery.

This has been the BIGGEST problem for so, so long. For the past 4 years every single competitive build has had the trickery trait-line. The 3 extra initiative should just be baseline — problem solved. I’d love to see more build diversity; acro and shadow arts are amazingly fun trait-lines, but are often omitted because of trickery and it’s such a shame :/.

Please Anet, address this.

One possible solution could also be to just copy the code from the ‘spear of justice’ but in place just give it a cast time instead of being an instant ability.. for balance reasons of course.

Straegen.2938:

…“Plucking an over-specialized build out of a pack of bunkers would be a utility worth running and create counter play that is very much missing in the current meta.”

Yes, the meta at the moment — especially in WvW — really supports running in larger numbers rather than smaller, coordinated groups. I think the notion of being able to reliably isolate a target is something that needs to be appreciated a lot more than it already is!! And scorpion wire fits the bill, we have the tool guys… it however needs to either:
a) track the target, or
b) travel at the slightly faster speed to avoid just been strathed or stepped.

Even for people who are experienced with scorpion wire, it is exceptionally demoralising when it doesn’t land on anything; it’s the reason why many just don’t bother anymore.. And that’s a real shame!!!

Lae

Bump – opinions continue:

NinjaEd.3946:

Agree 100%. There is nothing going for scorpion wire, not for damage, reliable cc, or even utility in any manner. The whole skill is just outdated as is most of the thief kit. There could be a lot of neat things done to bring this skill in line, biggest thing is for the developers to actually try something, rather than stare at it (don’t even think they do that, more like turn a blind eye.)

Give it something unique like “recharge steal by fixed amount (10 seconds, 50%, 100%? anything)” OR have it “pierce and steal boons, up to 3 foes get pulled, 1 boon from each foe.”

Anything at this point would be nice.

I really like the idea of maybe adding a boon steal to it.. there are some really nice boon-ripping skills that it would synergize nicely with – super awesome input. To be honest it just needs to hit though, the target tracking is dreadful.

There are so many unused unique utilities, especially with HoT now in full swing. The old ‘vanilla’ skills definitely need some attention.

alchemyst.2165:

I think it should function like guardian f1. Stacks bleed until you pull them. Initial piercing should do damage. Fix pull.

I would personally like to see the ability maintain its historical value in terms of functionality. That is, to pull upon impact rather than being a two-phase approach. Also I think the authenticity of the ‘spear of justice’ should be maintained and should feel unique, but I definitely like the idea of the Scorpion Wire applying a bleed, as well as tracking to the target properly.

kash.9213:

I’d be happier with even just the increased speed. I’ve learned to read people and can usually land it but I know it’s a pain, especially if you don’t use much. Unintentionally I use it more for interrupts and condition clearing currently while once in awhile I’ll pull someone off a wall or back into my kill box.

Absolutely kash, I feel what you’re saying! It’s not unusable, but it demands you to position yourself in a particular manner to land it. Perhaps just a speed increase would be enough to negate this issue? I’d love to see it used more often!

With that being said though, comparitatively to other pulls in the game it’s super lackluster.

MedievalMemer.6392:

Mmm, I do agree my good sir. I think there are quite a few skills in the game that could use at least a small amount of fiddling with if for nothing else than to make the game more “professional” for lack of a better term. I’ll use League as an example since its another game I play; not every item in league is a super viable meta thing, but at least every item does what it says it will.

That’s a really nice point. I mean, all other pulls in the game actually function as an on demand pull and don’t have all of these associated variables I have mentioned. It would be great to use it, and to actually see your opponent be dragged across the map!

I’d like to open up some discussion regarding the thief utility skill, ‘Scorpion Wire’.

Background & my take on things:
Scorpion Wire – at least in my opinion – is one of the skills that defines what a thief is at its core: an agile trickster that utilises the utility of skills and abilities (whether it be through stealth or evasion) to punish and vanquish foes. And what better ability to facilitate that purpose than a projectile that you can fling out, and pull a target with! In fact, I think most would would agree that it is this type of play-style that keeps us “thief mains” going; it’s extremely satisfying to employ our raw utility with perfect timing, and to win a battle because of that (particularly in PvP, and WvW). With that being said, Scorpion Wire is is probably the most satisfying ability to land that we have in our kit… but that’s actually the problem, isn’t it… how often do you actually land Scorpion Wire?

The Problem:
The mechanics of Scorpion Wire, compared to other pulls in the game (we’ll do some comparing later), are rather unique. I like to think of it as a slow ballista… just without any noticeable damage, that has the capacity to pull a target to you. What I mean by this is that the MAIN issue with Scorpion Wire is that it – like a ballista shot – can be simply negated by strafing (moving left to right, everso slightly). And with most players (or monster if you PvE) constantly moving, and darting in different directions, you can imagine how landing the ability in the first place can be frustrating. And if you cast it whilst moving, against a target that is also moving… just forget it. And that’s precisely what people do, thief needs reliable utility to function, and thus scorpion wire has become heavily underused and largely underrated.

And here are the reasons why (Warning: I’m Australian, so sarcasm inc.)

1. [It’s slow] The wire projectile speed travels quite slow, with a maximum distance of 1200 you can see it coming a mile away. To give you some perspective, after being cast at max distance I could probably lift my foot and slam it onto the “WASD” section of the keyboard, and the ability won’t land because I moved.
2. [It’s easy to see, and can be dodged… without dodging] It is extremely telegraphed with a short cast time (your character puts their hand their behind head, and then throws the wire out), allowing players adequate time to dodge, block, invulnerability, or… wait for it… move one square to the left during travel-time…
3. [Obsolete damage] The damage is EXTREMELY low with a base damage of 276. That’s right, your opponent may need therapy after being hit by anet’s generous 276 damage >.>… Now lets be honest guys, nobody uses Scorpion Wire to “1-bang somebody”, as it main function comes from being an on-demand pull (which can act as an interrupt, a gap closer and or a crowd control), but giving us a base damage of 276 is almost insulting, making the damage 0 would make no difference to its usability.
4. [Doesn’t support stealth gameplay] The scorpion wire currently reveals you if you use it in stealth, I presume this is because of the WHOPPING 276 damage you can deal, as any form of damage will cause you to exit stealth. This further isolates Scorpion Wire’s usability to players who run predominantly non-stealth builds (like myself), as there are more ‘advantageous’ utility skills available that facilitate stealth-gameplay.
5. [It has no functionality with basilisk venom] Currently when used with a venom, because the damage initiates first, the pull function of the utility will not trigger; heartbreaking considering bassie venom now make attacks unblockable!!

Potential fixes:

1. Reverse the order in which damage and the actual pull effect is applied, allowing for the pull to initiate first, followed by the damage. This would allow for synergy with venoms, without compromising the utility’s purpose or function.
2. Increase projectile speed by 25-50%. It’s simply too slow at the moment.
3. Adjust how the wire itself tracks a target. Maybe copy and paste the code that governs spectral grasp, or spear of justice, so that the projectile “locks onto” a target, rather than just travelling along a singular, linear vector. NOTE: the wire doesn’t need to be unblockable, it just needs to land in the first place. How is it that other professions get a pull that tracks, and we don’t? C’MON YO
4. Increase the damage, or take it away altogether. Both changes could help facilitate the utility being used in different ways. The damage should be at least 800. To give perspective, the warriors kick ability (another underused ability), is almost double Scorpion Wires damage at 552 with a 12 second cooldown, as opposed to a 20 second one.
5. Give it a bleed! If you’re going to throw a spear at something and then rip it towards you, then it would be thematically cool for it to leave a deadly bleed. Maybe it could be given more purpose through condition builds and playstyles.

Scorpion Wire thematically is a super cool ability, and even though it misses 40% of the time, I still run it sometimes because of satisfaction that ensues upon landing it (especially when plucking people off of towers in WvW). The phrase “build diversity” seems to be quite controversial lately, but I’d like to see some of the ‘less used’ utilities become useful so we have more options to play with; it’s the small things that go a long way.

I’d love to hear the voices of any Scorpion Wire lovers out there, and the community’s opinion with reference to potential quality of life changes/suggestions for the utility.

All feedback is welcomed (be kind please) & thanks for reading,

Lae – The Praetorians.

omg this is beautiful, I hope anet reads this! Scorpion wire opens up avenues for some super amazing play, and is such an underrated utility… unfortunately the way it currently functions makes it virtually impossible to land on a player paying attention.

this needs to happen! Full support (y).