Guild Wars 2

Great build, reminds me of the old school acro s/d. The short window of absurdly high effectiveness really makes it excel at skirmishing, something sword builds should do.

Off topic, but have you tried running any configuration with Valk or the new hidden killer? Stealth really becomes a limiting factor, but the burst you can shell out with sword in the 100% crit window is extremely high for being a heftier stat set. With that, when combined with revealed training and/or assassin’s signet, the already top ended power Valk gives becomes ludicrous. Really fun build to try out if you enjoy wonky s/d builds, albeit not the most practical. Also a ton of fun with s/p, though the stealth becomes even more of an issue, but 3.15x power conversion on pistol whip with ~3.5k power, 100% crit chance, and ~215% crit damage is pretty hilarious.

Just a real quick note that the text description on Devourer Venom on Thief still reads that it applies to three attacks, while the stack counter reads 2. Just wanted to give a heads up to be added to the description fixes.

IE:
Devourer Venom(2) (30s): Your attacks immobilize foes.
Immobilize (1s): Unable to move.
Number of Targets: 5
Number of Attacks: 3
Venom Duration: 30s
Radius: 240

I am playing around with the idea that a reasonable buff to Cripple for WvW could be making it have percent damage increase to falling damage taken. Not a massive amount, but enough to warrant what would be sustained from trying to take a fall with already injured legs. I feel that with the addition of gliding to WvW, this could be an addition benefit to fighting in your own territory, and overall would add more tactical play to the gamemode. Just a thought, let me know you agree or disagree, should you feel inclined.

Please for the love of god do not screw up the sound effects on the two best legendaries in game… Seriously, if you don’t want troll sound effects don’t make one of the troll legendaries…. While we are on the topic of sound effects, bump up the volume a few ticks on Chupa’s roar sound effects, they are way too quiet.

Most tonics kick you out as soon as you receive any type of damage. It required hitting it a few times, but it was a much better option than running out and drop combat. Basically, all the newest update does is prevent people from being able to kitten around in tonics during meta events and wvw zergs. The complaint is more that this has been an ongoing trend for ages now, that changes that ultimately detract from the fun and quality of the game are made to fix problems, then are never revisited for a specific fix. With items that server no other purpose other than entertainment and general fun, this overtime leaves them utterly pointless. The current state of open world consumable items shows this pretty clearly.

Flumek.9043:

Xeyon.6419:

The clocktower roof removal is a weird choice imo.

Its pretty much making kylo a non thief/mes exclusive map, but something average to what we already have.

Im a but scared of some too long kiting spots making it even slower map but well see, the rest i like about it

Yeah I mean I got that, it just looks off aesthetically. In other words, I find the way they remodeled the most odd.

Gotta say I hate the roof changes, and not just because I am a teeef. Overall makes the map look silly.

I still don’t understand why there isn’t a PTR (Public test realm). Have people do your work for you and make the pvp community more content in a single move. Then, since people would definitely contribute if it meant pvp would actually get balance, there shouldn’t be the go to excuse of people wouldn’t bother. They bother for raid balance, why not pvp… even if they only let upper tier players in, something would be better than nothing.

The clocktower roof removal is a weird choice imo.

Over the years tonics have gone from being a really fun set of wackadoodle collectibles to a set of by and far unused items bogged down with in game limitations.

First you removed the ability to use legendary auras with them…

Then you removed their ability to be used in around half of relevant game areas they used to be usable in….

Now you have removed the ability to keep them up in combat, thereby removing any further use in wvw and meta/pve combat…

I understand there were reasons for making these changes each time, but that does not change the fact that the overarching result is that tonics become unfun garbage. Similar to what happened to toys and consumable items, by doing a blanketing fix then not attempting to correct the issue that called for the fix in the first place, so the items just fade out of memory, you are continuously detracting from the overall fun mindset this game once had.

#MakeTonicsGreatWorth Even HavingAgain

A while back the cooldown of the trick skill Haste, was reduced to 50s, however, the haste applied by the tier one trickery specialization trait Flanking Strikes the cooldown remains at 60s. I feel like this was an overlooked change that needed to happen.

With that, the lack of synergy between this trait and the Deadly Arts grandmaster trait Improvisation has yet to be fixed, meaning the haste proc from flanking strikes still can’t be reset with trick skills, as it is intended to. Unless for some reason flanking strikes was meant to be the only skill activating trait that doesn’t receive benefit from improvisation cooldown resets.

A while back the cooldown of the trick skill Haste, was reduced to 50s, however, the haste applied by the tier one trickery specialization trait Flanking Strikes the cooldown remains at 60s. I feel like this was an overlooked change that needed to happen.

With that, the lack of synergy between this trait and the Deadly Arts grandmaster trait Improvisation has yet to be fixed, meaning the haste proc from flanking strikes still can’t be reset with trick skills, as it is intended to. Unless for some reason flanking strikes was meant to be the only skill activating trait that doesn’t receive benefit from improvisation cooldown resets.

Would anyone else like to see an umbrella glider added? Think Mary Poppin’s.

Sartharina.3542:

Xeyon.6419:

Most of all, I would say the sound effects for the projectiles really really need to be bumped up in loudness.

Blech… That C&C’s sounds AREN’T as loud and obnoxious as the Dreamer’s is a major plus for the bow.

Granted the pony noises get annoying, but these are outright inaudible. They are tiger roars; are you really suggesting tiger roars would be annoying if you could hear them?

I mean really, the default bow string sound firing a bow makes is at least twice as loud as the bow’s sound effects.

Just finished my Chuka and Champawat last night, and I wanted to briefly share some of my thoughts on it.

Overall really like the aesthetic of the bow; Was not fond of the concept when it was first introduced, but after working through the story, it warmed up to me. The kittens are an especially nice feature that personalize the bow beyond just another weapon.

Thoughts on needed improvements:

While the bow is exceptional, it is still somewhat lacking when put up next to The Dreamer. Two years ago, the bow would have matched up nicely with the Dreamer, but with all the added effects, it doesn’t quite muster up. The main three issues I see with the bow are as follows.

1) The sound effect is far too quiet. The firing sound effect for the dreamer is much more audible, and is far more integrated with the base shoot sound. Chuka’s shoot sound effect is very quiet and difficult to hear over the base shoot sound effect, which doesn’t mesh well.

2) The trail isn’t prominent enough. I love the trailing effect of this weapon, but I can’t help but think it doesn’t stand out as boldly as it should. Additionally, the trail doesn’t seem to work nearly as fluidly as the Dreamer does with teleports, other than infilitrator arrow which does trail quite nicely.

3) The projectile is a tiny bit too transparent. The projectiles are gorgeous for this weapon, especially their trails and distortion effects. However, they are just a tad bit hard to make out their form, especially in visually heavy areas (areas with alot of shaders and color filters).

All in all great weapon; extremely happy the last legendary to be added for now as a shortbow. Just needs some tweaks to make it on par with pony bow, in terms of effects.

Most of all, I would say the sound effects for the projectiles really really need to be bumped up in loudness.

Does in fact not work like that. Once per attack, so using them all at once wont result in multiple life steals.

Not a terrible idea, but it would need to be pinned on or replace an existing venom (cough* chill venom). However, I can’t see them going for this type of effect as it basically is just a better assassin’s signet, for your whole group. With that, it’d be bonkers op to have it stack with assassin’s signet’s effect. I’d say rethink your suggestion to be a more unique effect than just increased damage.
Say for example:

Your next 3-4 attacks effectively ignore armor.

Unique effect, still highly counterable, situational utility, and meshes well with other venoms (IE Basc and Devourer)

My biggest problem with these channels are the excessively long ones, primarily the bristleback’s barrage. Now that the damage was toned down, its not such a big deal, but before, when having a full 4s bristleback channel murdered you if you didn’t double dodge it, having all that damage chained onto you just as you enter stealth since the skill was already queued for execution was so irritating.

The system has been in place since launch, so I wouldn’t say it is a problematic one, but it does have issues when they add in excessively long channels. With that said, whether or not this system is dated, now that reveal is fairly common, is still in question.

So glad this thread started out like all the others on this forum.

Here is a Topic / Problem . Discuss
Barely relevant squabble ensues.

I brought this up as I was running into it being a problem when trying to use stealth defensively, not offensively. Like say I was stealing to a target to set up my get away in stealth, only to have my sleight of hand interrupt proc a pulm, knocking me out of stealth a few feet away. While I agree it is a pretty niche situation issue, I wanted to bring up the topic. There was a very brief period when pulm didn’t cause reveal, but it also didn’t proc any on damage activations like venoms or air sigil. So that might just have been the trade off, to have it cause reveal in exchange for activations applying to it.

A side topic, currently shared basc venom interrupts proc the traits of the person using the venom rather than the thief who shared it, unlike how condition damage works for shared venom, which only uses the thief’s stats. Should this be changed in favor of thieve’s traits, or should it stay as is?

Just wanted to make a quick post on this. Really don’t think pulmonary impact should cause you to be revealed on the damage proc. Kind of defeats the purpose of using this with hidden thief and sleight of hand.

Clusterbomb’s slow projectile speed was to encourage firing one from range, then firing a field out before it lands, but I rarely see it used like that, and for that matter, rarely see people going for the full bomb blast at range and not detonating it. With that said I think bumping cluster back up to 1200 in addition to a very slight speed increase so the adjusted bomb’s flight time would be the same as it is now, just over a longer range.

Aside from that I’d say choking gas definitely need another second of poison duration or some other small adjustment. Honestly, things like choking gas should be fields that get more severe the longer you have been standing in it, but I’m not sure they have tech for implementing things like that just yet.

As someone who has both, I’d probably say Bifrost, but both have pros and cons in my eyes.

Dreamer:

Pros-
-Not as common as other legendaries,
-Has among the largest number of effects for a single legendary : Footfalls + projectile mod and sound effect + draw sound and animation + active arm auras + active pony rainbow trail + growing tassels in WvW based on kills without dying + colored glass effects on the wings
-Flashy so it won’t go unnoticed
-Trail is gorgeous with thief mobility and flips.
-Shortbow is the staple weapon of thief and has been since launch. Vanilla weapon means any spec can use it.

Cons-
-Requires you have pink, or complementary colors to pink , in your armor setup.
-Ponies do get annoying after the billionth time you’ve heard it. and with that….
-Pony noise gets culled but the projectile doesn’t, so the sound effect gets sporadic, which can add to its annoyance.
-Doesn’t work with some whirl finishers any more because reasons.
-Doesn’t have a full aura, and the amount of effects can seem like the weapon is largely an after thought

Bifrost

Pros-
-Beautiful trail and weapon effects. Just the level of detail put into the staff is impressive. -Subpoint: It has different cut prisms that rotate around the head of the staff. With higher game settings, these prisms pick up and refract the rainbow color aura if you catch a glimpse of it at the right angle.
-Aura trails extremely nicely, and the footfalls are subtle, but still very appealing.
-Staff is usable, and frankly is usually the best weapon, on WAYYYYY more professions than shortbow. Making a bifrost means all your toons get a legendary, not just your thief and your ranger (*giggle).
-Projectiles are nifty on classes that have access to them
-Aura is gorgeous with thief mobility and flips.

Cons-
-So my biggest con here for thief, is that the effects of bifrost DON’T replace the weapon effects tied to your profession skills, and is one of the only legendaries like this. What this means is that when you swing it, you have the blue/red thief staff swing effect overtop of your rainbow aura trail effect. Since isn’t a problem on caster classes, it wasnt implemented to cover up the existing effects. This muddles your effects, and is irritating if you don’t like it.
-Alot more expensive, and in demand.
-As such, very common.
-Effects can go unnoticed, some could say not flashy enough (I wouldn’t personally)
-Limits you to only daredevil, not that anet hasn’t already done that for you.
-Projectiles aren’t appealing to some people, but that is mainly a complaint of elementalists from what I’ve seen.

Hope this helps! Overall, I’d def say bifrost. You’ll get the most use out of it across your characters.

Yeah, sorry forgot to include that.

So with the tooltip being above 12s for spider venom(6s base), it would only output a maximum of 12s. Additionally, the 33% does in fact not actually apply multiplicatively at the end for the actual applied poison. Only the tooltip has that kind of interaction.

Example: With 50% poison duration my spider venom was 9s. With potent poison, this tooltip went up to 12s, which makes sense as 9*1.33 = 12s. However when actually applied, the poison’s duration only ran <11s (as in 11 was never reached on the counter) which makes sense as 6* 1.83 = ~11s.

Conclusion: It doesn’t work how it appears unfortunately.

Yeah I double checked and it does in fact not apply anything above 100% regardless of tooltip, as Vincent said above. Still fun to play around with the tool tips; I managed to get my Serpent’s Touch up to 33.5s in wvw.

Just wanted to post some interesting findings.
So I tested this with under 100% duration and confirmed its multiplicative relationship.
Then I tested this with over 100%, using an expertise amulet, a venom sigil, and thorns runes for a total of 102.33% poison duration. The interesting relationship I found, was that instead of increasing my spider venom’s duration from 12s (6s base) to 16s, it instead increased it to 16.25s. Considering now that 6s * 2.0233 = 12.1398s which with a 33% modification would be ~16.15s, which would round up to a quarter for the tooltip. Very interesting indeed. Im going to do some additional testing in wvw and will repost.

The meta mentality is cancer. Don’t blame Anet for not fully adhering to it; blame them for their bad design choices or their lack of action when things need changing.

I’d say the main problem with thief is that we don’t have a clear role anymore, especially in raid environments. Stealth is crap in pve, and where it isn’t, it is exploited rampantly or provided from another class more effectively, and our mobility doesn’t fit well into encounter designs, particularly in larger scale. Maybe if we had any raid dps support, say boon spread or some ‘unique’ raid buff, we’d have a reason other than dps and interrupts to bring us. Why mesmers got alacrity (aside from it thematically making sense) and not thief still perplexes me, seeings how we have kitten for group support if the group isn’t faltering.

From the wiki for endless stamina.

“This effects vigor multiplicatively, rather than additively. This means that rather than getting double effect out of vigor, only a 25% increase in endurance recovery is seen. At this rate, vigor increases the rate of regeneration by 3.75% per second, compared to the base 2.5%. This is a difference of 1.25% endurance per second, or an extra dodge attributed to the effects of this trait every 40 seconds while under the effects of vigor. In total, vigor under the effects of this trait will generate an extra dodge every 13.33 seconds, compared to the base vigor rate of one extra dodge per 20 seconds. When combined with the base regeneration rate, this is a total of a full dodge every ~5.75seconds, compared to 6.66seconds for base vigor.”

Hope this fixes confusion. For the record; previously, thieves were the only profession able to boost their endurance regen over the 50% marker due to vigor not stacking with class based endurance regeneration sources.

Just wanted to say thanks for not overlooking this bug fix Anet, while it was left off the release notes. Flanking strikes properly gets cd reduction from trickster now! Happy day. However it still isnt recharged by improvisation tricks procs but at least it is usable again!

An unannounced patch change for this: THEY FIXED THE SYNERGY BETWEEN TRICKSTER AND FLANKING STRIKES. It now gets proper cd reduction. Happy day.

Still doesn’t work with improvisation but oh well.

Quick note here. The 1 dodge every 20seconds mentioned here for endless stamina, should it be buffed to 100%, is referring to a dodge every 20s (40s currently) FROM the trait, not from vigor. If you incorporate vigor, you are looking at a free dodge every 10 seconds, in addition to the base regeneration. In total, you are looking at a free dodge every 5s while under the effects of vigor, should endless stamina be bumped up.

To give a comparison, here are the current baseline stats for Endless Stamina:
Base Regen – 5% = Dodge every 10s
Base Vigor – 2.5% = Dodge every 20s
Base Total with Vigor – 7.5% = Dodge every 6.66s
Improved Vigor – 3.75% = Dodge every 13.33s
Base Total with Improved Vigor – 8.75% = Dodge every ~5.715s

The trickery trait Flanking Strikes does, in fact, not gain any ACTUAL cooldown reduction on the applied haste, as indicated by the tooltip, from the trickery trait Trickster. This breaks one of the main synergies for the specialization tree, and overall hurts the class. Additionally, flanking strikes no longer has any synergy with Improvisation from the deadly arts tree, in a similar manner.

Summing up, flanking strikes hasn’t been a Trick type skill since the bug fix when HoT launched, which means none of the traits relating to tricks affect it, regardless of tooltip updates. Takes literally 48seconds to test this out, PLEASE FIX. Thanks

Been awhile since this has been mentioned, so I’ll bring it back up.

Flanking Strikes does not get any benefit from Trickster in the trickery specialization tree, despite the tooltip updating, no actual cooldown reduction is seen. Likewise, flanking strikes can’t be refreshed by Improvisation from the deadly arts line, unlike all the other skill usage traits (IE trap on heal, blinding powder on hp ect.). These things together means that Flanking Strikes is likely NOT labeled as a trick skill, as it should rightfully be. Please fix this, trickery has no flexibility without these two traits working together.

This is a side effect of the steal change made awhile back when they adjusted it’s activation setup. Was back when they briefly made steal only usable with a target, which was then quickly booed out of implementation. As it stands, steal has a build in prevention mechanic to avoid it being wasted on targets out of range, since people complained alot about the 5s ICD for the skill to turn back over. Since using it with infiltrator strike at the same time attempts to queue it up while you are still out of range, it won’t fire, but should you use it a few milliseconds after it should work as intended.

Don’t forget to add Flanking Strikes not getting any benefit from Trickster as well as it having the same name as Flanking Strike.

The new elite is fine… Why would you want it overbuffed when other professions already complain about it being OP? I mean it has chase, two interrupts, and is the only skill in game with an stomp. You can use it to instantly kill players who are low HP, completely skipping downed state. You can queue it up on a target then teleport the finishing blow mid channel onto someone else… All of this while being our shortest CD elite. Anymore would be silly.

No sadly.

Staff, and even the DD grandmaster dodges, could use some of the Monkey king’s animations. I think someone mentioned why they weren’t used was because the tonic skin was built on a funky skeleton, so they’d have to be completely remade.

Shadowtrap isn’t actually a teleport; it is a shadowstep like the rest of the ‘teleport’ abilities for thief IE infiltrator’s strike and signet ect. What this means is that rather than cleanly teleporting to the proposed location, you instead ‘shadow walk’ there, which is a tie into the old guild wars 1 shadow realm. Since you are effectively walking the full distance instantaneously, you can run into some issues with terrain if there are any breaks in continuity, as in all of the ground covered isn’t considered part of the same ground. Almost alwyas when an error with this happens, you will not go anywhere at all when you finish casting the trap. Similar things happen on other skills, but most, like Infiltrator’s arrow, will give you a ‘No pathing" error message and not go off. However, in the case of shadow trap, this doesn’t happen, and instead, the skill is wasted. The other case when shadowsteps snag is when the target location is too far away from the cast location, in which you will go the maximum available range toward the target location. Where this gets screwy is when you look how the game considers walking distance for this, going off a displacement. Just how the shadowstep system works, and until it is overhauled, which i can’t see happening, or until shadow trap becomes an actual teleport or ‘blink’(See mesmer), this will just remain something you have to get used to. On a side note, there are so pretty nifty features in this type of setup, though with minimal usage.

TLDR: Shadow trap is a shadowstep, not a teleport, which makes it problematic. To avoid tripping it up, make sure you have a clear walking path to the intended location, and that the ground you are teleporting across is a solid piece. By now most things will be combined to be a single piece, but there are areas that aren’t ideal.

Agreed, it revealing entirely defeats one of the main purposes to it not being instant damage.

You can definitely have more than 1 pulm active, and activate, on the same target. One only need interrupt someone with a palm strike to test that out..

The trait flanking strikes receives no benefit from the trait trickster, despite the tooltip in the trait panel updating. Still is a base 60 second cooldown.

As of now whirl finisher projectiles DO NOT gain projectile modifications from legendaries if the whirl is coming from a skill that is not on the weapon skills themselves. (IE things like whirling axes or Lotus training do not change the whirl bolts, but bolts from weakening change do)

Thanks for not waiting to fix this. Now get to fix’n our other ‘bugs’ pweez. Flanking Strikes with trickster, withdrawl’s missing 10%, Sword delay <3.

Paulie.6215:

Aguri.2896:

Paulie.6215:

-1

I love this change. No more wasted steals.

Anet please leave this change exactly how it is.

If you were wasting steals its a l2p issue.

Nah.

Every single thief has wasted their steal on the millisecond before a target goes into stealth. Denying that means you’re lying.

No more wasted CDs.

One change that I totally agree with.

This could be said of literally any skill with a cooldown. By this logic all skills shouldn’t be usable if they have a chance of failing. Why not make blinding powder unusable while you have revealed active; who needs blind and a blast finisher.

Their priorities are apparent.

The sword swing delay is still definitely there, if not for base auto, for sure for any cast after an auto attack. Ex. Do a slice and hit headshot as the swing is ending out = half second delay of standing there.

Confirmed, they do not work together any more. GG

Dreamer since the update no longer effects projectile finishers like it previously did. Example, whirl combo skills while having it equip no longer produce ponies as whirl bolts.

Please fix this, it was a large part of the legendaries appeal. While you are at it, can you make the trail always up and not just on unstowed? It’d be nice to use it with a glider.

Dont forget no more stealth on command for shadow arts speced for stealth on steal. It’s not like it was a major part of the tactical advantage of being Shadow arts nor was part of the main core condi removal of the spec……

+1111111111111111

Trickery is already hurting heavily with the lack of synergy between Trickster and Flanking STILL not being fixed. Shadow Arts also took a pretty major hit as the stealth on steal trait is now kinda kittentastic for anyone not running a stealth burst build, or for anyone relying on stealth for condi removal.

Do you even play thief? If used without a target, steal goes on a full cooldown. If used while out of range, or out of pathing of a target, it goes on a 5 second internal cooldown. If this is what you were trying to say, try proofreading your posts.