Guild Wars 2

While I only played half a dozen matches, I learned a lot about the build.

1) It lacks map mobility. Sure, you have two blinks, but they both require targets, and you have no way to give yourself swiftness.
2) It’s one of those builds that fits somewhere in-between being glass and bunker, and I don’t mean in a good way like your more traditional Greatsword AH build. It can’t kill tanky people and can’t survive the glass people (unless you get the jump on them, but then you might as well be glass too to drop them quicker)
3) The build itself didn’t perform particularly better with Zerker or Soldier’s amulet. You moved slightly from the middle of the road towards one end of the spectrum or the other, but, you sacrificed too much from the other end. If a LB ranger is a 5 star on damage and a true-blue bunker is 5 star defense, you sit at like 3 and 2 starts depending on your amulet. It’s just not quite good enough to stack up against the more refined specs.

I’m sure you can use the spec and have success with it, particularly in hot join spvp or WvW, but it felt like a red-headed-stepchild to me: a bit out of place and trying too hard to be jack of all

It’s an interesting build, to be sure. I used to run Zerk with Sword/Torch+Scepter/Focus, although I’d spec almost full glass. I think this offers a more clearly defined role per weapon set, but it’s all up to playstyle, I suppose.

I’ll go test your version with various amulets and come back.

My alternate spec or WvW is a P/P spec. I actually prefer to run 0/6/0/4/4

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fZAQNAqaVl0Mpyp9Ox0JsPNBPhs9gEB8MazODeD-T1AEAA5DAAOBA/RAAA-w

The concept is for high amounts of vigor, might, and fury, to drop opponents quickly. I achieve maximum crit rate while I have fury up (don’t remember exactly, I think it’s near 80% in Exotics with Ruby Orbs), gain might on dodge and might on crits. Thrill of the crime assists in getting the initial fury, while Furious Retaliation helps give me enough fury to finish someone off.

I swap out Ricochet for Bountiful Theft for duels.

I choose to run it as a no stealth build, and have had great success.

Copy paste from my reply from the Ranger forums:

Long time Ranger main here (haven’t touched it since my return in preference of my Thief who, admittedly, had more or less become my main before I took a year or more off from GW2). I was surprised to see that Rangers had received any buffs at all.

I run a D/D Thief for roaming and solo camping in WvW. You get 3 dodges with full endurance and LDB. Basically, save your evasion frames for the rapid fire attack. You can dodge 99% of it with some patience. Don’t fight in Barrage, use Cloack and Dagger on the pet as much as possible (this is key, as any pet class should be easy pickings for a thief since pets cannot evade CnD).

You’re a thief, the master of deciding which fights you want to fight and which you don’t. If you get a poor opening on a Ranger, run away. Come back on your own terms.

Long time Ranger main here (haven’t touched it since my return in preference of my Thief who, admittedly, had more or less become my main before I took a year or more off from GW2). I was surprised to see that Rangers had received any buffs at all.

I run a D/D Thief for roaming and solo camping in WvW. You get 3 dodges with full endurance and LDB. Basically, save your evasion frames for the rapid fire attack. You can dodge 99% of it with some patience. Don’t fight in Barrage, use Cloack and Dagger on the pet as much as possible (this is key, as any pet class should be easy pickings for a thief since pets cannot evade CnD).

You’re a thief, the master of deciding which fights you want to fight and which you don’t. If you get a poor opening on a Ranger, run away. Come back on your own terms.

Interesting. I’ve toyed with five or six different trait setups, but haven’t gone 30 in Trickery for Berserker P/P. I feel like you would be vulnerable without triple dodge and Vigor on Heal?

I know what you mean about the Basilisk and Lyssa runes, as well as the danger of dropping Daggerstorm at a poor time only to get Immobilized. I’m just used to running Daggerstorm on account of typically running a condition thief.

I’ll give your variant a test in SPvP.

Staff Thief.

[Stealth Attack] Leg Sweep: Inflicts 5 seconds of Cripple, or a 1 second knockdown if hit from behind.

[#1 – chain] Sweep: Swings the staff in a wide arc, hitting enemies in front of you. The third attack in the chain causes the Thief to spin 360degrees, hitting all nearby foes.

[#2] Slam, 3 Initiative – The Thief slams the Staff in a downward arc inflicting 5 seconds of Weakness.

[#3] Shadow Swing, 2 Initiative- The Thief imbues his Staff with the shadows, increasing its range into a powerful attack. 800 Range.

[#4] Deflect, 4 Initiative – The Thief readies himself against the next incoming attack, entering a defensive stance for 1 second. Upon blocking a melee attack, 2 Initiative is refunded, and the Thief inflicts a stack of Confusion on his for for 5 seconds.

[#5] Twirl, 5 Initiative, Combo Finisher Whirl – The Thief rapidly spins his staff in front of him for three seconds, blocking incoming projectiles, and inflicting Vulnerability upon enemies hit by the Staff.

I’ve found that P/P can perform solidly in a 1v1 scenario, but definitely thrives in group fights. I even run P/P in SPvP to moderate success. Focus on being mobile and collapsing into existing skirmishes.

I’ve experimented with a number of set ups, but typically prefer an Initiative heavy trait layout of 0/30/0/20/20. I usually run stealth-less. Rocking Withdraw, SoS, Shadowstep, and Signet of Agility, and Daggerstorm. Full Berserker/Ruby everything. If I had the cash laying around, I’d probably pick up Travel runes.

What set up do you run, Barfoi?

I run a D/D condition set up.

From my perspective, there are two main ways to play it.

1) the “Stealth” variant (what I run)
0/0/30/20/20
Hide in Shadows.
Better against enemy condition builds.
Shadow Rejuvenation and conditions have great synergy with Stealth. You get 3 seconds of healing to yourself while they bleed out.
You get to run a second weapon set without gimping your build. Either P/D or SB.
Struggles a little in SPvP due to how Stealth interacts with conquest-based game-play
I mostly run it for WvW. Stealth+SB make you extremely slippery. I can solo Supply camps in under a minute. Stealth aids you in naturally fighting 1vsX situations.

2) the “Evasion” variant
x/x/x/30/30
Choice between Signet of Malice and Withdraw. If you like Signet of Malice, I highly recommend Apothecaries gear and the trait in Acrobatics which heals based on initiative usage. If you run Withdraw, take the trait that gives Vigor on heal.
Most effective with D/D+D/D with an Energy Sigil on each set. The idea is that whenever you swap weapons, you get a chunk of Initiative and half your dodge-bar.

The biggest problem with D/D condition builds is that you only really have one condition. Auto attacks can land a short duration poison, and you can toss out a Dancing Dagger every once in a while (great against Eles and Guardians, since their condition removal usually only gets rid of one condition at a time). You won’t kill even a mediocre bunker Guardian. You can supplement your conditions with a Venom; Scale Venom is preferred since it applies two conditions, making it harder to remove them all.

I haven’t tested out Dire Gear yet, but I’m uncertain whether it will offer more durability than Apothecaries. Carrion offers two offensive stats, whereas Apothecaries offers two defensive stats. Dire seems like an in-between, since, while it offers two defensive stats, it’s primary stat is still Condition Damage.

Best thing you can do while leveling with a new class is to:

1) Keep your gear up to level. If you’re 13, make sure you’re in level 12-13 Blues or Greens.
2) Invest in some Toughness and Vitality. Whether through Traits or Armor, Toughness/Vitality will drastically increase your survivability while leveling.

Have you tried Sword/Dagger? You can pull off some pretty cool maneuvering, and the Stealth skill on Sword #1 makes more sense for a ‘tank’ Thief. Plus, unlike D/D, the Dual skill is quite useful for a power-based build.

An aside: If my memory serves me right, Patience only yields 1ini/3seconds while in stealth, which is really low. If you want more Initiative regen, take Infiltrator’s Signet (also doubles as a Shadowstep and Stun Break).

Now, I’ve never actually tried a ‘tank’ Thief before, but, I suspect, if I did, I would do it like this:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fYAQNAsYVlYmSOHdy9E+5Eh/Byqzgmvs7BXtq8B-jwyAoLBRCCI9BiKAk9KiGblLsV3gUejmeBTdSEV7PKiWtMAVjB-e

Sword/Dagger as the main set. Slice/Slash have a nice arc for auto attack, and Crippling Slash cripples your target so you can keep up, and, more importantly, also causes Weakness, which lowers your target’s damage so you can eat hits more effectively.

Soldier’s Weapons and Armor with Knight’s Accessories yield a solid mix of defensive stats. Before food buffs, you have:
-3038 Attack (2038 Power)
-2774 Armor (1710 Toughness)
-23% Crit Chance (0 Crit Damage)
-60% Boon Duration (80% for Might)
-25% Percent Condition Duration

Runes enable you to keep yourself full of boons more easily. This includes:
-Vigor lasting 13seconds instead of 8 when you Heal
-Regeneration lasting 16sec on a 20second cooldown for getting hit below 75% health
-Thrill of the Crime lasting 18, 16, 16 seconds for Might, Fury, and Swiftness respectively (30second cooldown on Steal)
-Each dodge giving you 9seconds of might from your food source

Weapon Sigils focus on improving base damage.
-Force/Bloodlust on main set
-Energy on Shortbow for when you need to get out of dodge

Your base stats aside, you have a lot of base evasion to prevent yourself from getting hit.
-Flanking Strike
-3 dodges in a row
-high Vigor uptime
-Bowl of Orrian Truffle and Meat Stew for even more dodge rolling

As far as Utilities go, keep Shadow Step and Shadow Refuge, the third slot is basically for flavor. I put Infiltrator’s Signet initially, but Signet of Agility seems like it may fit the build better, as it will give you an on demand condition removal, as well as the ability to chain six dodges in a row. A couple other utilities make a good choice as well.

Overall, it’s not going to win you a beauty pageant, but it looks fun. If you want tankier runes and don’t like the Boon duration mimic, either Dolyak Runes or Emerald Orbs make solid replacements. You can also drop Pain Response for Power of Inertia (two stacks of Might per dodge!) and pick up Runes of Melandru or Hoelbrak.

Yeah. Definitely looks fun.

TeamBattleAxe knows what he’s talking about. I’ve seen a handful of his P/P videos, and he has pulled off some really impressive plays. If you can’t tell from his description, he recommends and plays 10/30/0/30/0.

That being said, I have had great success with a 0/30/0/20/20 build, but you’re missing one of the key traits: Thrill of the Crime. The idea is that you open up with using a little initiative, then steal for the might/fury/swiftness buffs and extra initiative. When you couple Thrill of the Crime with Furious Retaliation, you can get 24/30seconds uptime on Fury. In my opinion, it makes up for losing Fluid Strikes.

As aside, I actually hate the idea of Fluid Strikes. There will be situations where you don’t need to dodge, and yet, you’ll want to in order to pump up your damage by 10%. Dodging should, in my opinion, be used defensively exclusively. It’s why I had to stop running a Inertia build (2 Runes of Strength/Fire/Hoelbrak for 60% Might duration). Getting two stacks of might on dodge (food buff), and having them last long enough to perpetuate ~8-9 stacks of Might (more with Sigil of Strength), was good, but dodging offensively often leads to getting hit by a key attack that will lead to your death.

While Preparedness (increased Ini pool) only helps at the begining of a fight, Kleptomaniac (Stealing gives Ini), gives a burst of Initiative regen. If you Steal on cooldown (which you should be to proc Thrill of the Hunt), you get roughly 1ini/10sec: the same as Infiltrator’s Signet.

I find it hard to give up Ricochet. Yeah, it’s a useless trait in a 1v1 scenario. Got it. But when soloing camps, small scale skirmishing, or even Zerg vs Zerg, Ricochet really pumps up your damage. Pumping out constant Unloads can chunk one person, add half pain to a second, and then a third target gets even more pressure added to him (for reference, the first guy would take 8k, second 4k, and third 2k [more or less depending on RNG]).

I’ve been really enjoying P/P for WvW. You can really surprise people with the Unload damage.

P/P is fun, to be sure, but you have to play it with a certain mindset, or you will get yourself killed.

I love RHS 1h Sword builds. The one I used for a very long time is:

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQRAsd7flYgyCHFyKEf4Eh1jAeQ/h9AjcsjXFcIA-TwAA1CnIqRVjrGTNyas1MAZByGiZBA

But I’ve been experiementing with:

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fUAQRAsd7flYgyCHFyKEf4Eh1jAeQ/h9AjcsjXFcIA-TwAA1CnIqRVjrGTNyas1MAZByGiZBA

lately.

I think, overall, I like the first one better, since I get more might overall from it, as well as high Retaliation uptime, and a solid Condi removal from my f2. The second build is a bit more suited for group play, though.

Rune-wise, you can either go straight Ruby Orbs (most cost effective), or a slew of other options. For instance, a Might Duration set could be useful (2 Fire, 2 Strength, 2 Hoelbrek), I’ve also had success with Runes of the Flame Legion (5% damage is solid, plus, it helps increase your own Burning uptime so that you can get the 10% against burning foes from Zeal). Divinity Runes are always an option.

I feel like it’s also necessary to mention that these are primarily for running exploreables, so I’m trying to maximize DPS overall. In WvW or PvP, these builds will get stomped on (although, you will melt an upscale in WvW).

Build the dang thing first, then decide who to soulbind it to.

Here’s a secret: even after it’s soulbound you can swap it to a different character via clever use of Fine Transmutation Stones.

Just Black Powder his Cloak and Dagger. If he can’t go into stealth, he can’t use Sneak Attack for 5 free stacks of bleed.

It’s a utility weapon.

It has a shadow step, a combo field, an evade/cripple, a combo finisher, a bounce-based auto attack, and even an immobilize.

I would likely still use it even if it did zero direct damage.

I use D/D+SB, but other logical alternatives would be S/D (I feel that you would be better off keeping */D for Cloak and Dagger, but you gain access to Sword #2), or a second set of D/D, with the purpose of giving each Dagger set one Superior Sigil of Energy. Although, at that point, you’re almost better off running a full Unicorn build with Signet of Malice, Apothecary gear, and everything.

I would love a combat Staff.

[Stealth Attack] Leg Sweep: Inflicts 5 seconds of Cripple, or a 1 second knockdown if hit from behind.

[#1 – chain] Sweep: Swings the staff in a wide arc, hitting enemies in front of you. The third attack in the chain causes the Thief to spin 360degrees, hitting all nearby foes.

[#2] Slam, 3 Initiative – The Thief slams the Staff in a downward arc inflicting 5 seconds of Weakness.

[#3] Shadow Swing, 2 Initiative- The Thief imbues his Staff with the shadows, increasing its range into a powerful attack. 800 Range.

[#4] Deflect, 4 Initiative – The Thief readies himself against the next incoming attack, entering a defensive stance for 1 second. Upon blocking a melee attack, 2 Initiative is refunded, and the Thief inflicts a stack of Confusion on his for for 5 seconds.

[#5] Twirl, 5 Initiative, Combo Finisher Whirl – The Thief rapidly spins his staff in front of him for three seconds, blocking incoming projectiles, and inflicting Vulnerability upon enemies hit by the Staff.

That’s probably how I would do it. A tad more on the defensive side, rewarding players for perfecting the timing of the block skill.

Also, it’s often times better to be more conservative with your initiative and cooldowns, since a condition Thief is going to want to draw out the conflict anyway.

When I fight Rangers, for instance, I start off with two DB’s and a CnD, followed by a couple more CnD’s until they drop Healing Spring. Only after Spring is dropped do I bother with using Caltrops and all-ining my initiative into a DB-DB-DB-Steal-CnD combo.

Jaded has been working hard on building up our Guild Missions, at the moment, we have the Guild Bounty unlocked and have had a good bit of fun with it.

I also updated the main post to represent our expanding officer base.

A solid tip, thank you for sharing it.

However, I suspect that, against the better opponents, they have the durability to survive your initial burst anyway. Against the opponents you can gib, I think baiting a venom is wasted effort.

Mad props for whenever it works, though.

Hjulstad.6317:

Been thinking about get a condition set for my thief ever since i created it but was always affraid that dd condition build would lack to much damage in wvw.. How much does your bleeds tick for *? And do you feel that you actually Bring anything to the table in 20+vsXX ? Been playing S/D with pvt gear with Ruby orbs and also went D/D with same gear for abit..

I bring a lot to the table in Zergfights. Large amounts or AoE bleeds/cripples, stealth stomping, and Caltrops can single-handedly down an enemy player who’s chilling on siege in the back without me ever having to leave stealth.

Bleed tics vary based on Corruption stacks, might stacks, and food. I think my base with no buffs is around 107 per tic? I think it can go as high as 130ish.

D/D Condition Thief here.

The D/D Condition Thief excels in one primary area that other Thief builds lack in:
Zerg Surfing.

You have more AoE condition damage, which is longer lasting, and you never have to give yourself the reveal debuff. You don’t have to worry about enemies body blocking Sneak attack.

Pop a stealth skill, run into a zerg, and, right when you become revealed land a Death Blossom or two, during which time you will be dodging, and immediately Cloak and Dagger.

While Stealthed you can drop Caltrops and Dodgetrops.

Three seconds later you can either repeat a Death Blossom or two, or simply CnD again.

Sure, in a straight up 1v1 you’ll struggle to kill professions with high rates of condition removal such as Bunker D/D Eles, but you’re not typically easy to kill either.

You can solo camps, solo tower Lords, and get kills while inside of a zerg, without having to worry about that pest-of-a-reveal-debuff.

It’s quite fun.

Potent in small scale conflicts too. I have fought P/D condition Thieves. It’s quite humorous when they go for a CnD and eat a DB in the face, and lose 6 Ini due to my evasion.

I run a condition spec.

Bunker Ele’s are my bane.

They won’t kill me, but I won’t kill them.

The biggest thing the Sword Dagger combo gives you is more leap finishers for Healing Spring.

I can do this solo with my Death Blossom build.

It’s quite fun.

I run a D/D+SB Condition Thief with 0/0/30/20/20 traits and Carrion gear.

Lots of evasion (rotate between Death Blossom and dodge rolling).
Lots of tiny numbers. 20k hp.

Hide in Shadoes
Caltrops
Signet of Shadows(WvW)/Smokescreen(Dungeons)
Shadow Refuge
Daggerstorm

The build takes a bit of practice to get right, but isn’t overly complicated. It’s easier to PvE with than to PvP, since you can evade scripted attacks, so it might be right up your alley. Unfortunately, it does suffer the same issues with other condition builds of bosses having condition caps. With Pizza, I get up to 95% bleed duration and can keep around 20 stacks of bleed on my target even without using the Utility Caltrops which can add up to 14stacks on its own.

It has been a really great week for Darkhaven to stretch our legs.

I hope we keep this battle for several weeks to come, so that we can continue to improve.

I remember when we first started fighting GoM and HoD. We lost by a significant margin for a couple weeks. It took some dedication to get where we are today, and I know we can keep pushing forward.

It’s been a pleasure, Borlis Rock. Keep the good fights coming!

If you get knocked below 25% while Daggerstorming you’re in Melee against more than you can handle.

It’s ranged, aoe, cripples, and reflects projectiles. No need to get so close to what you want to kill.

Kalkz.5297:

Mhmm w/e

@ DH Commanders : 50 BP and 40 AR in Our borderlands… Mhmmm what we should do, Got an idea!. Lets all move to eternal and take SM! lololololol

They’re onto us!

Darkhaven has a lot of room to grow.

They did it to help thieves level stealth-based builds.

Without the change, your target would begin to reset every time you stealthed.

I think it’s less about wanting to remove control from the player and more about the feel of the spell.

Withdraw is acting literally with regards to its definition: to back away.

The spell makes sense as it is. Whether or not the spell should be remade into a “Tumble” that utilizes directional keys is a different matter.

It’s annoying at first, but once you understand when it procs, you can actually plan for it.

I love it.

I don’t think it’s a matter of Condition doing better damage than Phsyical Ranger builds, but rather an issue that stems from the Ranger class’s relative lack of spammable condition removal. We only really have Healing Spring (long cooldown) and Emphatic Bond (uncontrollable).

I haven’t PvP’d on my Ranger in quite some time, and typically prefer for Troll Unguent over Healing Spring. All of these factors lead me to be fairly confident you’d whoop me, but if you still want to try, feel free to get a hold of me in game.

I feel your condition build will struggle against classes with extremely spammable condition removal such as Shout+Soldier’s gear Guardians/Warriors or Bunker Ele’s far more than my build does.

Rock paper scissors.

I too run 0/0/30/25/15 on my Ranger, although I opt for a physical variant with Greatsword, with PTV Armor, Dolyak Runes, and Knight’s Accessories.

3k Power, 3200 Armor, 21k hp, and a pet who attacks for 1400-1800 is nothing to laugh at, especially when I have a Chill, a Stun, a knockback, two knockdowns, an AoE fear, and an AoE root.

Properly timed CCs to interrupt heals are devastating.

I feel like Rangers make some of the best defensive builds, because the damage that comes from our pets doesn’t diminish for us beefing up.

For those looking for something to read:

http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/66729-how-to-be-a-great-greatsword-ranger/

As an aside:

I know a lot of Rangers complain about Immobilization and our lack of options to remove it. Remember that any of the aforementioned Condition Removal options can remove Immobilize (other than Evasive Purity).

My biggest complaint is with the weakness of Signet of Renewal and bears being underwhelming in PvP situations, which leads to us having a heavy reliability on Healing Spring for condition removal.

This is a very similar to a build I heavily recommend to all of the Thieves in my guild try.

10/30/30/0/0 with full Valk gear is very potent, and very durable.

It’s my second-favorite Thief build behind my D/D Condition build.

The Greatsword now lets you move around while you block, and will block any and all ranged projectiles until you block a hit in melee range.

Inflation tends to effect much more than just the price of goods, though. It usually is coupled with increased wages to compensate for cost-of-living.

Thing is, the game doesn’t really pay you more for playing it now than it did months ago. You still get the same amount of silver for finishing a dungeon or event. Sure, the prices of some goods are going up, but those are almost entirely t6 mats (such as Lodestones), which are not readily available for just playing the game. You have to farm them with copious amount of Magic Find gear.

Whether or not inflation is happening in GW2 is immaterial: at the end of the day, premium items are becoming harder and harder and harder to afford to your average player. When the price doubled from 200g to 400g, I shrugged it off and figured I’d get there eventually. But when the price doubles again to 800g, how on earth is your casual player supposed to keep up with that rate of cost increase?

toffin.5032:

Good Job on the flips, but I think you made DH a little mad after you broke down the wall to the keep.

“The wall”? They knocked down four walls and almost had a fifth.

Btw, HoD: that 8-Golem rush in SM was impressive. Shame we pushed you back with half your numbers.

Hey, xXMapcoXx! Jaded[Jade] is recruiting active, friendly, and mature members! We are a family-style guild looking to form long-term friendships through PvE and PvP. We have a forum and a vent.

We are located on Darkhaven, but if you’re not a fellow-Darkhaven member, don’t fret! You can chill with us in /guild chat and maybe run some dungeons cross-server until you feel that we’re worth the transfer (which I can’t help but feel that we will be!)

Things you can expect from joining Jaded:
-friendly Guildies
-dungeon parties
-light PvP, both WvW and Structured
-an abnormal love for Quaggans

Some of our Guild Boosts include:
-10% Magic Find boost at all times
-5% Experience boost at all times
-15% Karma Boost on Saturdays for your Jugs of Karma
-Guild Stash, Treasure Trove, and Deep Cave all unlocked

Jaded is mostly comprised of members between the ages of 18 and 81.
We are most active during North American evenings.

Take a gander over at our forums over at:
http://jaded.boards.net/

If we sound like the right home for you, you can either mention it here, introduce yourself at our forums, contact some of us in-game through whispers or the mail system, or combine several of these options.

Guild Co-Leaders:
- Vecuu Raine
- Raelin Flameseeker
- Shira Nolar

Officers:
-Duh General
-Bllades

I look forward to hearing from you!

-V

Jaded had a lot of fun in WvW last night after reset, including Ninjaing GoM’s Garrison in their Borderlands

jkctmc.8754:

Silferas.3841:

Thieves are used to dealing with DPS or trap rangers, who are easy prey. Then they meet a properly built beastmaster tank once in a while, and their illusions of grandeur crumble, while I stomp them effortlessly.

Tell the thief to come heart of the mists at desolation EU. I will duel him

You do understand sPvP does not equal WvW, right? Thieves are at their strongest in WvW, so I doubt any Thief would duel anyone in sPvP, where the ruleset is dumbed down, with a multitude of nerfs.

Aside from stats changing around, you also don’t get food in SPvP, which most thieves absolutely love for WvW.

I just thought I’d way in as a player with a Ranger main and a (non-traditional) Thief that I usually take to WvW.

Any player can beat any player on any given Sunday. Things happen.

The largest strength of the Thief class is their ability to pick their fights:

“See that guy? I think I’ll kill him. Oh wait, he hurts and is super beefy! Pull out!”

Thieves disengage so easily. It’s what they do. If a fight doesn’t go their way, they leave. And do you know what they do then? They come back and try again while your stunbreakers and elites are on cooldown, and then you die.

adamshadow.5246:

So P/P is usually spamming unload?

Yes. You get some minor utility out of a short duration Vulnerability, a Daze, and an expensive dark field, but for the most part, it’s auto-attacking and spamming #3.

I run a D/D+SB condition Thief.

Yes, it is viable.

It is not the easiest build to execute, however. It requires you to be inside an enemy zerg for an extended period of time, since you have zero burst. Clever use of Death Blossom, Dodgetrops, Caltrops, and Dagger Storm, can allow you to cause an unreal amount of condition damage in an AoE while you jump in and out of stealth via Cloak and Dagger.

I feel that 30 points in Shadow Arts is almost mandatory for it to work, though.

I run 0/0/30/20/20.

With classes starting up again, I’ve neglected this thread too much.

Free World Transfers will be coming to an end soon! If you’re looking for a home away from home, join us on Darkhaven!

-V

Durzlla.6295:

You’re one of -those- thieves… I see how it is…

I’m also a Ranger Main, but usually opt out of WvWing on my Ranger due to my inability to disengage from a large-scale conflict. She’s strong, but a fair bit unconventional as far as Rangers go. Most Rangers usually opt for either a glass-cannony approach, or a Healing Beast Master build.

-My Ranger has 22k Health, 3k Attack, and 3.2k Armor.
-My Pet would win a 1v1 against most Thieves.
-I use Troll Unguent rather than Healing Spring.

I deal with Thieves quite simply: I auto attack them a few times, let my pet knock them down, at which point I pop Greatsword #5 and swap Pets for Quickness (pet swap before the skill lands so that the new pet with quickness has the 50% attack buff). After eating the quickness burst, they usually get knocked down again by the fresh canine, panic, stun-break, and run away. If they don’t stun-break, I use Quickening Zepher and they die.

Smart Thieves only fight targets they think they can defeat, which leaves you the option of either opening with tons of burst so they run, or auto-attacking until they think they have an edge, then go in for the kill.

It really depends on the type of Thief you fight and the Type of Ranger you play.

Rangers can go toe-to-toe with Thieves. The biggest problem is our difficulties in chasing one down to decides to disengage. Entangle is great for this, as are the Shortbow, Axe+Warhorn, and Greatsword weapon sets.

I play a D/D+SB condition Thief primarily for open WvW, and I hardly ever struggle to fight a Ranger, as a Ranger main, I know that Healing Spring is a powerful ability and don’t fully commit to a kill until after I see it drop.