Guild Wars 2

DeceiverX.8361:

I genuinely believe static condition duration food (both + and -) should be removed from the game as a whole. it serves no purpose than to screw over WvW balance and bolster what is already an overpowered spec from dire/perplex in general and supports repeated condi dumps with little negatives.

I agree with everything you’ve said, but just to be a bit pedantic, I wasn’t running +40% condi duration food, nor was I running a condi damage wrench. The spec is already OP without the food, and the food just makes it worse

Yam.2891:

where is tacquito bandito ?_?

Rest assured, he’s my #1 fangurl, and we already have a weaponless revenant duel set up for whenever the expansion drops.

Gabriell.4856:

Those players weren’t too bad…its just that your build counter theirs. I believe if given an opportunity to change the build, the results will be different.
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At the end of the day, I really don’t see your point other than Feline Grace being strong but that is going to be fixed in the expansion.

As I said earlier, it kinda defeats the purpose of dueling to counter your opponents build. Yes, a DS ele will win 100% of the time, but the point of dueling is to practice your own build or to have fun. And many of the builds in the video are meta or pretty close to meta, yet still suffer some losses to a weaponless dire thief.

Cynz.9437:

Red Jay.2516:

Darn, reading some comments in this thread…

Screaming and kicking and spitting vitriol at OP rather than willing to admit that maybe… maybe there is a certain combination of thief skills, traits and runes that might be a bit too powerful and need an adjustment.

Just wow. Thief subforum at its best.

there are ways to beat his build, it is pretty much useless in competitive pvp for example… besides it is just a youtube video, obviously those contain best shots, i think it did serve it’s purpose and was fun to watch imo

Well, dire/plex don’t exist in PvP, thankfully. I do think caltrops and needle trap are underestimated in PvP, but thieves aren’t usually an on-point bruiser, so very few people run them.

Gabriell.4856:

LOL. Let me bring my ranger condi trap build w/o weapon then. Using even better trap like burning and bleed and if I can hit him with entangle after withdraw then gg. What was your point again?

Again, there are builds that can match that of his build even if he is using weapon.

I’ve actually fought a weaponless trap ranger. That build is 100% no joke. I don’t want to derail the thread, but I think some survival condi ranger builds are also problematic. Just because there are stronger builds out there doesn’t mean this one isn’t also strong.

Red Jay.2516:

Darn, reading some comments in this thread…

Screaming and kicking and spitting vitriol at OP rather than willing to admit that maybe… maybe there is a certain combination of thief skills, traits and runes that might be a bit too powerful and need an adjustment.

Just wow. Thief subforum at its best.

This is actually fairly tame for this subforum, and it’s much better than the reception on my first weaponless video. I don’t expect everyone to agree, so I welcome the discussion that follows.

evilapprentice.6379:

So that’s your criteria for “Op enough to be nerfed”? Someone’s PvP highlight reel showing “some success”? You realize how silly that sounds, right?

I saw that video when it was originally posted. I even tried the spec out. It’s fun, it’s different, and you’re right that it’s not completely useless. It is however no where near good enough to be considered a meta build, and not deserving of nerfs. At least part of its effectiveness (50%, imo) stems from the fact that your opponents don’t know what to expect. Players see you rocking S/D and don’t expect dodge trops/caltrops/condition pressure. If it became popular enough to be run by multiple players, it’d quickly fall into the “Good enough for Hot join/Yoloq fun but not much else” categeory, and nothing in that category is strong enough to deserve nerfs.

I didn’t say his spec needed a nerf. To make my position perfectly clear, I think a very specific brand of dire P/D condition thieves in WvW needs a nerf. The biggest culprit is dire gear.

However, what makes these thieves so strong isn’t just dire gear, as other condi specs (including the S/D condi build) demonstrate. 4/0/0/4/6 is just an overall strong trait spread that, when paired with dire gear, perplexity runes, and +40% condi duration food, becomes overkill. Anet could correct for that a number of ways, but the best way to do it is to get rid of dire, so that other condi specs (like the S/D build) don’t get touched.

SBI has the largest OCX below T2, with about 30-35 players active in WvW in that time zone. Only one OCX guild as far as I’m aware; most of those numbers are pugs.

That said, if you’re looking for action, I recommend T1 or T2. OCX is pretty dead in T3, with SBI PvDooring most of the time. That may change when HoD comes up, but I remain a bit skeptical.

Xtinct.7031:

When it comes down to it, nobody running dire is going to like a nerf on dire stats. However, it may very well come to it down the road into the expansion (i.e. potential of the OP dire revenant, theif, ele, warrior, mesmer, etc), almost in the same manner they nerfed %crit dmg into ferocity for the sake of pve reasons. Unless, anet is hell bent on making condition dmg the new meta for pve purposes post expansion, then we will just have to simply adapt and put up with it.

Well, I think dire has been allowed to stay because Anet balances around PvP and PvE before WvW. WvW is in an interesting place because many of the strong condi specs in WvW don’t exist in PvP, and Anet desperately wants to promote condi builds in PvE without addressing the fundamental problem with boss encounters that discourage condi in the first place.

To some extent, I can understand that they want to balance around organized 5v5. But on the other hand, if you’re not running a proper comp or not running 15 people in a ball, even a mediocre dire thief will do well against you just because of how ridiculous the risk/reward is.

evilapprentice.6379:

So please, explain to me, why is it you feel that the class itself is the problem when the build goes from “OP Broken can’t win against it it should be nerfed” in WvW to “Almost completely worthless” in PvP, the only real difference in the 2 specs being their gear/rune/food buff choices?

I specified earlier that I think the biggest problem is dire, but that’s not the only problem.

To be completely fair, I believe someone posted a video earlier that ran the exact same traits (yes, even hard to catch) in PvP and had some success with it. Granted, he took refuge and shadowstep over needle trap and wire, but the general 4/0/0/4/6 caltrops idea is very similar.

evilapprentice.6379:

I don’t see how every variable was in my favor. If anything, I think I’m at a significant disadvantage starting without weapons, but compensate by running full dire/perplexity.

Every variable was in your favor to get away with claiming that your spec won without using weapons. You picked Thief (which gets most of its condi pressure from traits and utilities). You set up unrealistic fights where players would have just escaped from you every time you ran to heal instead of waiting conveniently in range for you to get back. You ran a spec that your opponents were unfamiliar with, allowing 1 easily dodged skill to do most of your DPS, and you did it all while running a statline most already agree is poorly balanced (you would have lost most of your fights without both the toughness and vitality on Dire).

I stated earlier that in open WvW, players might have been able to run, but since these are duels, they have to attack to try to win. However, even in open WvW, this build has pretty good chasing power, so it’s unclear opponents would have been able to escape anyway. You’re right about scorpion wire and dire, but, again, dodging scorpion wire is often easier said than done. I’d disagree about condi pressure from traits/utilities, since the 20606 P/D build oftens runs triple deception on utilities and still outputs strong condi pressure.

Bret.6940:

This will most likely be my last post, i pulled this from reddit. “Keep in mind I didn’t include my losses (for obvious reasons), and even good players mess up eventually.” Sure i can agree with that but what i made out is your trying to say dire perplex is op so the fact you lost some duels means you choose not to put (skilled, or good) people in your video. Instead you gave these guys a heads up and they still lost, so i have to make the assumption they arent the best or you asked them for the sake of the video for you to just flat out loose to you. The mesmer shoulda have moaed, eles should have brought Diamond Skin.

You misinterpret what I wrote on reddit. What I meant was that some of the players in the video won duels against this build, but the fights they won weren’t included because this is a montage. Yes, they could have swapped builds to hard counter me at any point, but that defeats the purpose of dueling: to have fun or to practice the spec you normally run. No, none of these fights were staged.

Verilan.2963:

+1 mango, very entertaining!
When the specializations launch, maybe you can do a “offhand pistol only” vid, seeing as we’ll be getting a “torment on interrupt” trait, combined with perplexity and 5stackconfusion steal

Frankly, I think sleight of hand alone will be enough with the new torment trait. With pistol 4, it’s just going to be ridiculous. I’m confident Anet will put an ICD on it eventually, as they did with perplexity.

Sagat.3285:

@mango dying from confusion vs a weaponless thief is pathetic, even if they are competent they were stupid in strategy most of my WvW specs wouldn’t lose against you for the simple fact that I’m not viciously hunting you for you loot. The greatest nerf WvW needs is + & – condition food maybe it’s because I main a trapper rune thief in WvW but I’m not one to lose to perplexity tricks.

Edit: They are nerfing SA and Feline Grace in traits changes also.

Well, if this were just open world WvW, they might be able to run away. However, in a duel, they have to attack me to win. And they aren’t really nerfing SA. X/D is losing cloaked, but gaining resilience, which makes dire condi thief even stronger.

evilapprentice.6379:

You weren’t trying to prove anything, but you specifically mentioned you felt that it proved something. I was merely pointing out how you were wrong, like how I’ll point out that your last sentence above is wrong. The problem with LR is it tries to tell you how to play, and penalizes you if you don’t play that way. It’s hilariously bad design, whether or not you jury rig it into working for you or not.

In some sense, every trait tells you how to play, so that’s a pretty vacuous statement. The problem with LR is that it’s mandatory in SA, not that it’s necessarily a bad trait.

evilapprentice.6379:

Saying it’s good in duels has no value – there is no place in the pvp sphere where duels really matter, so it’s akin to saying it’s a great trait in PvE – doesn’t matter if its true, you posted a WvW video, so it doesn’t matter.

It does have value to people who enjoy dueling or to people who don’t PvP. Value isn’t determined entirely by what Anet balances around. I was just trying to point out a scenario where people might find it useful in the same way I have.

evilapprentice.6379:

WvW is by it’s nature unbalanced. The game’s balance design is explicitly based around 5v5 SPvP. That probably sucks for WvW, but that’s the way it is. Don’t get me wrong, I think the Dire amulet was an awful design choice, but that’s the issue here, not any specific spec that uses it.

WvW is unbalanced as a game mode, but that doesn’t mean Anet should ignore it in balancing decisions. I agree that dire is the biggest problem, but I don’t think it’s the only problem.

evilapprentice.6379:

Trying to blindly predict-dodge steal is silly, and bad play. Considering how most of your DPS was wrapped into Trops and Needle trap, dodging scorpion wire is the obvious priority – the fact that no one figured that out shows that they didn’t really understand what your spec was doing.

To be fair, it’s not exactly a common spec. But yes, the trick is to avoid scorpion wire, not steal. And yes, a lot of players do try to predict-dodge steal, and some of them are quite good at it too.

evilapprentice.6379:

All I’m saying is this video doesn’t really offer anything worth discussing. You displayed a bunch of fights where almost every variable was in your favor, and came to a conclusion everyone who has a basic understanding of the games mechanics came to – the Dire statline is silly.

I don’t see how every variable was in my favor. If anything, I think I’m at a significant disadvantage starting without weapons, but compensate by running full dire/perplexity.

Sagat.3285:

Only problem I have is this was a duel video…even if it’s wvw they still balance around group play make a video playing weaponless in a 3v3 or 4v4 and so they have a reason to nerf it your video proves nothing much no I am not a perplexity casual PvE noob coward thief.

It’s true that skills aren’t balanced around duels, but condition thief is still ridiculously strong in small scale 3v3 – 4v4. My video also isn’t aimed at nerfing weaponless thief, but dire/perplexity (or dire/krait dire/balthazar) P/D thieves that usually run shadow arts or acrobatics. The point is that if I can already beat decent players without weapons, then this spec is just completely faceroll with weapons.

evilapprentice.6379:

How exactly have you proven that? Almost everything you’re doing is passive – you don’t even have weaponskills that could potentially reveal you when LR procs. All this proves is that you have a very basic misunderstanding of other players issue with LR. Let’s also note that “higher levels of play” and “WvW” don’t really belong in the same sentence in most situations.

I wasn’t trying to prove anything about LR. That’s just my opinion about the trait. I understand perfectly well what most thieves complain about: they hit 25% health and try to stealth from, say, a CnD, only to have LR proc in the middle of the CnD animation. I admitted that this was less of a problem for this particular build because it didn’t run weapons. However, I also find that I don’t really have a problem with LR, even when I do run weapons, and I think most of the complaints are L2play issues.

evilapprentice.6379:

Most peoples complaints concerning hard to catch are in PvP, which revolves around capturing small circles. Being randomly placed somewhere else, the trigger of which is in someone elses control, still suffering from the CC is awful for an “automatic escape” trait in PvP. “In Duels” also isn’t a very good metric for gauging a skills usefulness, since duels are not the primary focus of any PvP mode. The new version is much better.

You’re reading too much into what I said about hard to catch. I only said it was strong in duels. I didn’t say it was good in PvP, nor did I say it was better than the new version.

evilapprentice.6379:

All you’ve really proven is that Dire is a silly amulet, and that a condi thief using one is OP in the very specific situation where sitting in stealth as long as possible isn’t penalized, in a big, wide open field that allows you to take maximum advantage of your mobility to stall for CD’s, against opponents who wouldn’t just run away from you at that point.

You’re right about that, but that “very specific situation” describes pretty much all of WvW. Unless you think Anet should neglect WvW entirely when balancing, you should also find the risk/reward of condi thief imbalanced.

evilapprentice.6379:

Let’s also note that you considered most of your opponents “decent”, and I saw alot of scorpion wires into trap/trops hit – any experienced player would have seen that coming a mile away. They should have had dodges galore to ensure it missed considering you weren’t using weapons. Seriously, you had 3 other abilities to use once trops were down, and one of them (DS) has an insanely obvious animation. Your opponents could have just spammed dodge any time you were visibly casting an animation and avoided 90% of your trops damage.

Again, this is all correct in theory, but in practice, it doesn’t work out that way. A lot of opponents try to avoid steal and will blow dodges when they think I’ll steal. Other times, they’ll see me casting caltrops or needle trap and try to dodge to avoid those (note: you can cancel both animations to bait dodges). After they’re out of dodges, it becomes very difficult to avoid scorpion wire, which will force them into the trap/caltrops. Lastly, improvisation will often recharge one of the utilities, making it even more difficult to keep track of what I have.

Bret.6940:

So your using bleeds and confusion with no weapons, just utility for your bleeds.
anyone one of your oppenents should have spammed laugh because if they stay out of your trap/ caltrops confusion wouldnt do any damage at all.

This is right in theory, but is much harder to pull off than you’d expect.

Avoiding needle trap isn’t as easy as it sounds because I can place the trap in stealth, place it in melee underneath them, or wire them into it. Once I get them in needle trap, the immob allows me to stack a fair number of bleeds by comboing it with caltrops. Kiting this build in particular can be difficult because of steal, wire, needle trap, and the near perma-cripple they have.

Bret.6940:

win an outnumbered fight against people with real skill and post a video, also upload a video of you fighting an ele thats immune to condi above the certain threshold and tell me condi is “OP” that i would like to see…

If players are actually skilled, it should be nearly impossible to win outnumbered, regardless of build. However, if you’re interested in seeing me do some 1vX, you can check out some of the other videos in my channel.

Just because there are a few specs that hard counter condi builds (like DS ele) doesn’t make condition thief any less OP.

Bret.6940:

what im saying is for this person to stop picking on people who dont know what condi cleanse is and fight real specs.

I’m not picking on anyone. If anything, you’re the one calling them bad players. Most of the specs I fight against in the video are either meta or not far from meta. Some of them do have pretty good condi cleanse (D/D ele, medi guard, etc.)

Nephrite.6954:

If only anet would stop trying make Thieves a condition class then it’ll definitely help boost our power builds. Cause then people would stop complaining about how broken we are ==.

I don’t have a problem with thieves using conditions. I just have a problem with the risk/reward of condition thieves currently. I think the biggest problem is dire gear, which just minimizes any risk involved in playing the spec. A very good first step would be removing dire gear.

Other big problems include the way that SA or acro synergize with dire, how steal is a one-button-do-all, and how thieves can stick on targets amazingly well while still applying heavy condition pressure (as opposed to, say, PU mesmer).

I think this will only get worse post-patch, with needle trap on heal and torment on interrupt with no ICD. The torment, especially, is going to be a pre-perplexity-nerf level of broken, especially given how easy it is to interrupt with sleight of hand or pistol 4.

Bret.6940:

if you think your that good without weapons come try that on BG and JQ in wvw and when you face people that know how to play you will see its a l2p

I don’t think I’m that good, even with weapons. I think that condition thief is extremely high reward/low risk, making wins possible, even against decent players. That said, I also don’t think BG/JQ have better duelists than do the other tiers, having played in almost every tier. My win/loss ratio would probably be around the same up there as it is down here.

roamzero.9486:

Meh, a competent Ranger could wreck that setup, or really any class that can kite a bit and keep ranged pressure.

Its no wonder the video was mostly wrecking melee-distance classes, running caltrops kind of does that in a dueling situation.

You’re right about the ranged pressure, but kiting can still be difficult with because of the cripple, steal, wire, and needle trap. A number of players in the video were ranged as well.

Bret.6940:

Ive never been one of the people who complain about last ref or hard to catch. sorta stinks they are changing hard to catch but seriously who are these noodles you are beating on with out weapons?? I just feel bad for those guys they really need to learn how to play. Anyone who knows what condi cleanse is shouldnt be loosing to a guy without a weapon.

That’s just the thing, though. I don’t think it’s a L2play issue. Acro and dire give this build tons of sustain, and the nature of perplexity/condition thief makes it so that you can apply tons of condition damage, even without weapons. With weapons, the spec is completely faceroll.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlmgJOkFdfM

At the urging of some friends, I’ve uploaded a sequel to my first weaponless video.

Discussion

Last time, my intent was primarily to entertain, but also to shed some light on just how broken condition thieves are. However, instead of that, the discussion more or less devolved into one big criticism of “your opponents are all bad, so condi teef isn’t OP”.

In an effort to respond to that, I’ve only included clips against players I would consider at least decent, from a variety of WvW tiers. Every one featured in this video is competent, and I’d even go so far as to say that some of them are very good.

Condition thieves (especially dire with perplexity/balthazar/krait) are incredibly powerful in small scale scenarios, with almost no risk attached. The active defenses from acro-trickery allow me to avoid most telegraphed bursts and the passive sustain from full dire lets me straight up tank everything else.

As always, comments, criticisms, suggestions are all welcome.

Addendum

I’d also like to point out a couple of things about last refuge/hard to catch.

1) Last refuge: In a couple of the clips, I would have definitely lost without the last refuge proc. Granted, it’s not as much of an issue for this build because this build doesn’t use weapons, but at higher levels of play, last refuge still saves you more often than it kills you.

2) Hard to catch: It’s actually quite strong in duels. A lot of thieves like to steal + backstab, but hard to catch will automatically shadowstep you away (faster than any human could react), causing the backstab to miss entirely. Similarly, a lot of S/F eles gale —> phoenix mechanically, and hard to catch will move you out of phoenix automatically.

Vavume.8065:

mango.9267:

No, the trait is fine. Has some niche uses in WvW and is pretty good in PvE. If you dislike it, just don’t take it.

Niche uses in wvw? please name one.

Two groups are pirate shipping in a choke. You get caught and pewpew’d to death. Concealed defeat gives you a smokescreen that lets your team quickly res you without getting pewpew’d as well.

You get bursted down, drop a smokescreen, and let the other thieves on your team blast for stealth to get you up or to leap through for less costly stealth.

These are just a couple of examples of niche uses in WvW. It might not be the most optimal choice for every build/comp/scenario, but it’s not entirely useless either.

No, the trait is fine. Has some niche uses in WvW and is pretty good in PvE. If you dislike it, just don’t take it.

oEnvy.3064:

What needs to happen is it needs to trade places with Resilience of Shadows. RoS is way too OP as a minor trait and blind on stealth is useless as GM.

Agree 300%. This is the most sensible change.

Agree about critical haste. Agree that CS is underwhelming. Also don’t think hidden killer is worth taking CS for, especially if you don’t play dagger mainhand.

However, I don’t think it’s a big deal that CS is underwhelming. Thieves traited into CS for two main reasons: stat bonus and executioner. Now that stat bonuses are removed from trait lines and executioner is in DA, having an underwhelming CS line isn’t that much of a loss. If anything, we should see it as freeing up trait points because you basically spend 6 non-trickery points in DA instead of the 8 non-trickery points for mug + CS today.

Posted this in another thread, but I’m posting it here too.

I must not be playing the same game as everyone else because these changes are kittening amazing for every kind of thief. In fact, I would say that these changes make thief borderline OP.

1) Executioner and panic strike in the same line
2) Improvisation is getting a HUGE buff (if you opt for that over executioner)
3) Resilience and rejuvenation simultaneously
4) Potentially setting needle trap every time you heal (I can definitely see people taking this over mug)
5) Trickery is more or less the same

With stat points now separated from trait lines, 60606 will be absolutely insane, providing damage, unmatched finishing potential, great self-sustain, and tons of team utility.

Even if you choose acro, swinder’s equililbrium has got to be one of the most OP traits for S/P or S/D thieves. Imagine how easy it is to evade a random AoE in a team fight, and now imagine shaving 1s off steal every time you do (with only 1s ICD). That is just an absolute godsend.

TL;DR: every trait line is amazing except crit strikes. 60606/60066/60660 will all be extremely powerful builds.

Christ, people complaining about feline grace change are completely missing the bigger picture.

First, we get panic strike and executioner in the same line. Second, we get resilience of shadow as a minor trait, giving us both 50% dmg reduction in stealth and insane health regen in stealth. That is already a huge buff to thieves. I daresay this will make thieves absolutely OP again with 60606.

Even if you decided to spec into acro, you have hard to catch, which is getting a pretty substantial buff, or you have swinder’s equilibrium, which is kittening amazing. Imagine how easy it is to evade random AoE in a team fight, and now imagine shaving off 1s on steal every time you do (with only 1s ICD). That is just borderline OP.

I don’t understand how any thief can QQ about these changes.

Unlucky Tyrant.5970:

mango.9267:

…I can’t believe you’re upset enough to even bother posting here in the first place.

Guilds have done far worse. It’s just a game. Who cares if your assault failed? If you have an issue, take it up with the guild or the server in question. No point posting passive-aggressively here.

I will give you an example as to why I am being aggressive in my responses.

Some kid just came into my thread and said that they cant believe I even bothered posting here in the first place.

Even though they have posted in an aggressive tone, they are saying its “just a game” and that I should move on.

Like geez kid, who died and made you king that you could tell me what is acceptable on your forum, and who sits there and says “its just a game”, then decides to engage on a debate on the forum website of a videogame lol.
Right.
Riiiiiight.

Edit:
Come to think of it, why are you even posting on this forum if “who cares” is your opinion?

Why would you even engage in conversation if this wasnt worth your time?
Bad troll.

Jesus, you are so mad.

When most people get upset after a specific incident, they talk to the commander/guild/server in question. There is no point in posting it in the general WvW discussion section. You’re clearly angry about a specific person from a specific incident, which has no bearing on any general WvW matters.

Of course, you’re still free to post it here, just as I’m free to tell you that you’re wasting your time here.

If the moderators visited this subforum with any frequency, this thread would probably be locked for the reasons I described.

…I can’t believe you’re upset enough to even bother posting here in the first place.

Guilds have done far worse. It’s just a game. Who cares if your assault failed? If you have an issue, take it up with the guild or the server in question. No point posting passive-aggressively here.

Just wanted to post that I’ve been experiencing this. Happens to me a decent number of times in the middle of Obsidian Sanctum, which is mostly flat terrain.

For example, I’m in the middle of pistol whipping my opponent, and I try to steal, only to get that “target too close” message. My pistol whip is already hitting them, as I stand just in front of the target, and my steal still fails to activate…

All of the (terrestrial) stolen bundles you get from players are amazing.

A lot of posters in this thread are underestimating how powerful throw gunk is as a downed cleave, ethereal field, and area denial. Even more mind boggling is how anyone can deny how amazing healing seed is: an incredibly long water field that clears conditions on pulse and allows you to abuse your spammable blasts/leaps.

If I had to pick the “worst” one, I’d honestly pick blinding tufts (because it contributes the least team utility IMO), but even then it’s pretty strong. If we include PvE, then tooth stab is by far the worst.

ok but why are you playing on a potato????

I’ve said this elsewhere, and I’ll say it here. I prefer a good bunker like a healway guard or a d/d ele. If I had to decide between the two, I’d probably pick d/d ele because their mobility allows them to disengage better than a healway guard.

A lot of people like thief/thief or thief/mesmer because they like to stack stealth. However, this is really only effective at the lower end of the skill curve. Stealth won’t help you against a proper 2 man comp or against decent opponents who outnumber you. At some point, you need someone who can take the focus off you and allow you to dish out your damage.

What often happens in thief/thief groups is that when they run into a proper 2-3 man comp, both thieves will land their burst, but fail to generate a down because the enemy has a bunker support. Even if they did generate a down, it’s very difficult for either thief to stomp due to how punishing cleave damage is. Then both thieves will be forced to stealth repeatedly to avoid the focus from the enemy burst and usually end up failing to kill anyone. This is why you don’t see many thief/thief comps in higher level 2v2’s.

It is possible to permastealth using D/P and utilities, but it serves no purpose other than hiding in a keep or tower or something.

CnD’ing repeatedly isn’t really permastealth, since you have to wait for stealth to end before CnDing again. But yes, that’s still possible to do.

Since this thread is now an SA vs. acro thread, I just want to say that I think acro is just as forgiving as\ SA against anything other than full condi builds. I don’t think either is easier to play than the other.

I do think SA promotes slower play because you sit in stealth for a lot longer to reap the benefits. This often works to the detriment of your team because you contribute nothing while sitting in stealth.

On the point of the video, I think most of the criticisms are fair. There are some glaring gameplay mistakes. On top of that, I don’t think there’s much interest for a P/D 20606 video to begin with.

Lol @ all the answers with 2 thieves. It’s not gonna work if you run into a proper 2 man of equal skill or a group of greater numbers.

As a thief, I’d prefer a good d/d ele or bunker guardian. At some point, you need someone who can take the focus off you. Otherwise, both of you thieves will just end up stealthing and disengaging for most of the fight because you can only land one burst before needing to peel.

This is also why you don’t see 2 thief groups do well in 2v2 tourneys and stuff.

BFMV.3198:

That is absurd. if you drop a refuge and just happen to, in a fight, have full endurace, you have 2 dodges base. Not everyone runs shortbow. Ok, so revenant drops field, you dodge twice, because you have to maintain 100% uptime otherwise BAM, you are out. Even if you manage to successfully dodge twice, the field pulses 4 times [4 seconds], which is a far longer time. Also, using shortbow 3 would most likely reveal you and or throw you out of refuge anyways.

Yes, your argument is flawed

If you drop a refuge where your opponent can immediately drop an AoE on it, you’re already screwed, regardless of what class your opponent is playing. Place your refuge well, and it shouldn’t really be a problem.

coglin.1867:

Do you support afking at boss fights so it scales for those participating as well? Or afking in PvP for the XP to level? Intended purpose applies there as well.

I am not seeking for your approval to validate my perspective. I still feel all 3 of those examples are equivalently degrading the experience of other players.

Those are all straw men. To be clear, we’re talking about players who enter WvW primarily to kill other players and who rarely defend/attack objectives. There is nothing wrong with that kind of play, as it’s completely within the terms of services and does nothing to grief fellow players.

If you were more honest with your analogies, that would be like someone who was decides to do the heart instead of the world boss on top of it. Or someone playing a really bad build in PvP focused on killing other players instead of holding points. There’s nothing wrong with either of those things.

Intentionally afking to grief other players, in any game mode, isn’t supported by the ToS, but that’s not what fights-players are doing.

coglin.1867:

Phantom.5389:

I don’t need to fear about that problem arising since I am on NSP. We usually don’t queue EB during the week and on weekend we only queue one map (most of the time it is EB). My choice of server was not random. I did chose a low population server because of what I intended to do.

Thanks for your concern.

Of coarse you do not fear the problem. You are creating and promoting the problem.

As much as I can appreciate your desire to have fun on a personal level, the fact that you are unwilling to aid your team when called upon, and only in what they consider the most dire of situations, is evidence that you do not care for the game modes purpose. Your behavior in this situation adds to the reason players such as myself, will leave a particularly server. you mentioned your servers population and standings in a negative way, when it is likely your desire to ignore your team entirely , has contributed to it.

I was almost agreeing with you (for once) until you made this post. That was completely unwarranted and completely wrong. No one should feel ashamed for playing the game they paid for however they want, provided its within the terms of services. You say fights-players shouldn’t ostracize PPT-players, but why are you attempting to shame fights-players in return?

And that load of crap about “intended purpose” or whatever is complete bullkitten. Anet designed WvW to have a scoreboard, but the players design WvW’s end-game.

At the risk of derailing this thread, I’d just point out that you’re speaking about meta builds in conquest.

Thieves do well against shatter mesmers, but do poorly against CI lockdown, PU condi, and various phantasm builds.

The reason thieves are taken over other zerk classes in conquest settings is because thieves either burst harder than alternative zerk classes or they rotate faster than alternative zerk roamers. This goes completely out the window in non-conquest modes, where I think shatter mesmers and other zerk classes contribute more than a thief does.

Agree that the video doesn’t show enough for us to make an accurate assessment, BUT judging from what we’ve seen so far and Anet’s comments about the map, it does seem like the map focuses too much on vertical drops and choke points.

This is the completely WRONG way to design a WvW map. I hope Anet takes the overwhelmingly negative feedback against EotM/Skyhammer map design into serious consideration before releasing this new map.

Eh, it’s not a huge issue. Just autoattack to cancel the spin, then dodge. You have enough time to avoid all telegraphed attacks like that.

ITT: idiots actually taking this thread seriously

From what we’ve seen so far, revenants aren’t a real threat to thieves. You have far greater mobility than they do, so you can always reset the fight if need be. It’d be somewhat like fighting a PU mesmer. You use your stealth/mobility to control the pace of the fight, and you can reset easily if you mess up. Worst comes to worst, the fight comes to a stalemate, and you waste time before moving on.

Having a bunker healing guard (1200+ healing power) is a requirement in any serious small scale WvW comp. Most of the successful 5v5 death match comps have 2 bunker healing guards.

It’s just not as effective in zergs or in point holding, which is why you see it used less elsewhere.

Both medi guards and D/D eles counter zerk thieves. Either you spec for full SA, or you avoid the fight altogether.

Against medi guard: Use S/D when he’s in S/F and use SB when he’s in GS. Basically, don’t play his game, since scepter will outdps your SB and GS will outdps your S/D. There are no tells on smite conditions or judge’s intervention, though some guards like to precast whirling wrath before porting. I use more CnD + auto than FS + LS because stealth will hide your positioning briefly, and the daze allows you to get some good autos in. The entire fight will revolve around picking at him until you’re able to land the stolen ability. When you land that, you need to burst hard and GTFO when the daze subsides.

Against D/D ele: Abuse sword 2, since they have to be in melee, and you need to clear burning. It’s slightly more manageable than medi guard, IMO, because you can kite them much more effectively. You have enough evades to avoid most of the bigger attacks like burning speed/fire grab. I prefer to use FS + LS over CnD + auto because of the boon strip. Similarly, the fight will revolve around landing the stolen ability. Wait till he swaps out of water, hit the chill, then go for the burst.

Baron Oakley.1539:

Nope, IoJ and NSP are completely sick of that ****, that’s why NSP did worse than HoD last week. IoJ has lost population after nine consecutive weeks of that **** and they even lost to CD last week (13th place).

I feel HoD/SBI’s pain, I really do – but it’s someone else’s turn.

IoJ actually beat CD last week, but it was close because there was an active effort to drop Glicko. To my understanding, some people on NSP share our sentiments when it comes to manipulating Glicko to avoid the T3 roll.

Shiyo.3578:

I use withdraw with 2/6/0/0/6. Is panic strike better for group PVP than critical strikes as well?

Problem with using withdraw on 26006 is your condi management. You’re relying on shadowstep alone, and that often won’t cut it in WvW. 60206 lets you take shadow’s embrace, which helps a ton with condi clear.

As for which trait spread performs better in a group, it’ll depend on what your group needs. 26006 will hit harder and finish targets faster, especially when your target is below 50%, but 60206 gives you more utility with immob, weakness, and possibly improvisation. I also think 60206 is a bit more forgiving because you can use shadow’s embrace to clear condi’s, and you can use withdraw instead of hide in shadows for your heal.

There are a number of things you could work on. A few off the top of my head:

1) Use your stolen abilities. In most of the clips, you either never use them or you hold onto them far too long. As a result, you’re stealing less and gap closing less frequently. In a few instances, using the stolen ability would have been the best option. At 2:47, using the whirling axe would have saved you from going down to that rapid fire. At 8:17, you could have dropped the healing spring and blasted with your SB to save your engi from going down. At 12:24, heartseekering through the healing spring would have allowed you to save your heal.

2) Don’t use refuge to secure stomps. The only time I’d consider using refuge to stomp is if there’s a zerg near the downed, and I need to stealth immediately. Otherwise, just CnD and stomp. Refuge is better for reviving team mates, running away, or healing up.

3) A ton of missed CnD’s that could have been avoided by panning your camera down. Helps with gauging the proper distance between you and your target. Keep in mind you can still turn your camera mid CnD if your opponent moves out of the hitbox cone.

If a player is feared and taunted at the same time, which one takes priority? First application? Last application? Or does taunt take priority the same way that stun takes priority over fear?

Sorry if this has been answered before, but there are too many separate threads on taunt for me to easily sift through them.

I think the responses in this thread are being far too generous. Your gameplay needs a lot of work mechanically, and your decision making is very slow. It helps that the players in your video are bad and that your build is very easy to play, to the extent that it often carries bad players.

Yes, every class has cheesy builds, but that doesn’t make yours any less cheesy, nor should that fact justify sticking to a faceroll build. Other builds will force you to learn the thief mechanics, improve your gameplay, and contribute more to your team.

That’s not to say that you shouldn’t play how you want or anything like that. If you enjoy P/D condi, then go for it. I realize not everyone has the time or intent to improve their gameplay, but at the very least be aware about how much the build does for you.

Routa.4136:

This is exactly the problem – people like you think that it is merely a tool for stomping and reviving now. Shadow Refuge already has the role of being the supreme support skill, and even if you do want to use BP for these purposes you might as well use it BEFORE initiating the said action.

First, shadow refuge does much more than blinding powder does. If you can help it, you generally don’t want to waste shadow refuge on a stomp or a res. This is where blinding powder comes in as a less costly alternative that allows you to preserve refuge. Second, it’s not always possible to secure a stomp by initiating blinding powder before the stomp (e.g. standing in a guardian’s symbol as they go down). By being able to active blinding powder mid-stomp, you’re able to secure stomps much more effectively.

Routa.4136:

For example, if you run pistol in offhand most of the time like I, you could lay down Black Powder prior to blasting it with your Blinding Powder for longer stealth and leaving behind a blinding field.

The blinding powder change doesn’t affect this at all.

Routa.4136:

But this took a massive toll on my favourite way of using it as a filler in the middle of a combo or a burst, essentially just removing that way of using it (and reducing the damage capabilities of this ability by a large margin in the process). Blinding Powder was way more versatile than it is now.

You can still use it in the middle of a combo. In fact, it’s even easier to use in mid-combo because it’s now insta-cast. If you want to cancel an animation, use stow weapon. If you’re getting revealed, either turn off autoattack or time your blinding powder better. There’s no possible way this reduces your damage.

Routa.4136:

It is not merely a tool for stomping. Even if it was, chances are that Shadowstep would be better at it, as well. A tool for reviving? The aforementioned Shadow Refuge would like to have a word with you.

Like I said, you’re better off securing stomps without blowing either of those two utilities.

Assuming you run the meta build with strength runes and power of inertia, you’ll usually have 8-10 stacks of might. At most, you lose ~50 power, which isn’t terribly significant.

The difference becomes significant if you use signet might, battle sigil, and/or might-on-dodge food.

I have no idea how you guys can consider this change a nerf. It’s a substantial buff to be able to blind mid stomp or continue reviving as you stealth. There’s pretty much no downside to this.

Gonna quote myself here:

mango.9267:

Note that this isn’t comparable to last refuge at all because you control when you activate blinding powder. If you’re getting accidentally revealed, that’s entirely your fault for activating the utility at the wrong time.

Nephrite.6954:

What’s the best 1v1 duel build by far? Especially against engineers. S/D panic strike? Or d/p both require burst but which one do you think is better?

There is no single build best for dueling, since every build will run into some opposing builds that are difficult. The overall best (and easiest) would probably be 20606 P/D dire, followed by maybe P/D cele. After that, it’s really a toss up; 20606 D/P is very strong, but will struggle against some bunkers. 20066 S/D is also a popular choice, but might struggle against some condi builds. I wouldn’t consider panic strike a dueling build.

Against the meta cele engi, P/D dire does very well because you can tack on conditions faster than they can clear.