Guild Wars 2

No, you don’t need single level 80 in group to finish any sub lvl 80 explo. Only thing the number of lvl 80s in group will affect is time needed to finish.

As to the AC: I’d say wrong group composition, lazy people not willing to buy few cheap greens (or yellow for that matter) on auction every now and then (when I level up alt, I refresh greens every 5 levels (it’s like 15s for everything).

@Todd: While that sounds good on paper (and Devs said that too), sadly basically every dungeon is just DPS race to the end and tbh venoms just plain suck in dungeons.

And again, that’s why I said I see PW build as the ultimate one, you still have same utilities as any other thief (at least the better ones). While you can interrupt anything and everything (except attacks which can’t be interrupted, like Subj Alpha and there PW shines most, you don’t need to worry about dodging anything, with good timing just just need to dps him as usual) if you know your stuff.

P.S. Every inexperienced thief should use Omnomberry pies / ghosts and SoM (extra broken if u use PW and have 3 mobs to hit), make thief pretty much invincible. With enough experience, you can go full power / prec consumables.

Don’t use D/D in dungeons, you’ll be limiting yourself to single target damage with D/D and in dungeons you want as much AoEs as you can get.

When I hit the cap on my thief, I had same mind set (did too much sPvP at that time). But it’s not that good for PvE (good for map running, not that good in dungeons).

From my POV, there’s only one build I find outperforming everything else for thief in dungeons.

Use S/P (yes, PW spam all the way), go 20/30/0/20/0. Trait for as much ini regen as you can and take as much DPS stuff you can get. Get Berserker armor and weapons, Cavalier jewelry. I switched amulet and rings to zerk, because now after I run all dungeons bazilion times I know what to do in every situation so I can dodge stuff that can hurt me (if my timing on PWs is not prefect so I have to dodge).
I alternate this build with 10/30/0/20/10, which has bit smaller DPS, but has bit more group utility.
SB on secondary weapon slot is no brainer, it’s just too powerful weapon to not take it.

Go into dungeon and interrupt / evade everything into oblivion Oh and dodge after PWs, you can charge them up on your way back to mob and you’ll get one extra might from that and more evades.

My utilities: Ini regen signet (I use precision one if I know I’ll be dodging a lot or I will need extra condition removal, but that doesn’t happen often), Shadowstep (I never take this one out) and Refuge (only slot I swap as situation demands).

With this stuff, you’ll run out of ini only if u have mesmer in group, but Time Warp is just sick in combination with loads and loads of PWs you dish out!

I’ve seen lot of people suggesting usage of #6 with pistol offhand, but from my experience it’s just not worth it. Difference is small and 6 ini is far too much for 4s of blindness, which roughly translates to two attacks of any monster (if you time it well).

Obvious downside of this build is, it’s pretty much just PW spam, so it’s kinda boring to play.

P.S. If you know dungeons, you can pretty much interrupt each and every boss’ major attack (combined with pistol #4).

Technically speaking CnD+Steal+Stab is three shot, not one shot.

This also works only if you don’t see thief coming, if u can see him going your direction, it’s just L2P problem of how to dodge.

I use two build on my thief: full zerk GC backstabber (but that’s more sPvP, doesn’t work well in WvW) and tanky backstab (3.1k attack / 2.5k armor / 67% crit chance / 78% crit dam), which works pretty good in WvW until u run into condition heavy fight (one nasty damaging condition when you removals are on CD and you dead).

Only problem I see so far with WvW is terrible performance on settings lower then “Best performance” option. My rig was able render massive battles in EvE without problems and there we talk about something ANet can only dream about (hundreds people in same place and no hick ups on client and server side). I had stable FPS even during Jita blockade (in the system), yet my GW2 is unplayable when there are more then 30 people on screen just running around (add some fancy VFX in fight and you play turn based strategy).

Compare it to average castle siege in Lineage 2 (yes, it’s old engine, but I play WvW on gfx settings which looks much worse then Lineage 2 on best settings), again hundreds of people at one place, yet no performance issues what so ever.

Also seriously kittened up rendering. I’m tired of being killed by invisible zerg even if I try to be careful and watch my surrounding, the game just doesn’t render what’s near me.

But I agree on AoE limit, that just sucks. Did any developer actually said how they get the limit? Only thing I can see behind this is lacking server HW, so they don’t want too many calculations per one effect.

Little OT: So far I can agree that only part of GW2 witch works fine is PvE, everything else is either alpha/beta stage (yes, I’m looking at you sPvP in comparison to richness we had in GW1) or just screwed up in so many ways (WvW).

cloudysan.4397:

What if you wanted to go direct damage but not going full glass cannon?
I dunno but I usually like to have a safety net just in case.

That’s why I use Cavalier accessories, rings and back slot with emerald jewels (to get some precision back). You can get those from karma vendor in Straits of Devastation.

Only Vit bump I have is from traits, all my builds have at least 15 into Acrobatics tree to have more dodges.

Lately I was running this build:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fYAQNAoYVlUmaOHdy9E95Ex2jdqTeypIpItTxVtKA

With good combination of food buffs (+100 though / +70 prec food and power oils) I can get around 3150 attack and 2600 armor. Sure, damage output is bit lower then if I go full glass, but I can run through enemy zerg and survive it.

With such build you also don’t need to do usual CnD + Steal combo, you just need to steal and stab, saves loads of initiative on alpha strike.

Ad SB: Definitely try it. Every thief should have SB up all the time, it’s great defensive tool and great offensive tool.

What other said. I’ll just add up that in WvW you can mix stats as you like, you won’t be pigeonholed into few combination of stats as you are in sPvP.

Also be prepared that you’re gonna need loads of gold / karma to get same quality stuff as in sPvP, because you want to be full exotic and that stuff is expensive.

Question is if you want D/D burst damage or D/D condition build. Personally, I don’t like D/D condition, it’s boring to play. So my advice will be for D/D burst damage.

Knights armor sounds good on paper, but in fact it’s not good choice imo, because you won’t get enough +crit damage to utilize precision on the gear (and burst builds are all about having high crit chance and high crit damage).

I use full berserker armor, weapons and amulet, rest of jewelery is Cavalier (power/though/crit damage) with emerald jewels inside (prec/though/power). I use runes of the Pack (mainly because these were rather cheap, stashing money to get Air runes). Sigils I use: D/D is Superior Accuracy + Air and SB is Fire.

Now, thing lot of players overlook is food. I use Sharpening Stones / Oils as “potion” buff. I use +100 power / +70 prec food or +100 thoughness / +70 precision food. Depends on situation.

I also agree with Speedy that quickness is seriously overpowered no matter how you get it. But I don’t agree with the conclusion to get at least 2-3 sources of it. I have it only traited (precision tree, trait X), that’s more then enough (not gonna waste sigil slot for it and definitely not gonna waste utility slot for it). You want D/D build, it’s not essential to get quickness for this build. If u wanted PW build, then sure, get as much of it as possible.

Oh and get SB instead of S/P (or get rid of D/D and make PW build). Learn it, love it. Life saver.

The build I use is pretty much standard WvW backstab build (atm running 20/30/0/20/0). Experiment with traits to find combination which works for you

Now there’s the thing about utilities. Lot of people run with Shadow Refuge, lately I’m thinking about swapping it for something else, because while it’s great skill in lot of situations, it’s pretty much suicide button in fights. Bad players will let u use it for full duration, smart guys will kill you inside, because u just showed them where you are and you can’t escape the ring until stealth becomes permanent (that is if you want to escape). If I’m gonna swap it, then it will probably be for pull (good form of CC and priceless when attacking keeps).

My utilities are so far: Speed signet, Shadowstep (essential for every thief) and SR. As elites I swap between Venom and Thief guild (don’t use Daggerstorm, that’s good against dumb people, otherwise it’s suicide button).

Mix of berserker and cavalier items (big thanks to ANet for adding exotic cavalier, I finally got rid of only rare items I had on me and I finally could spend some of the 500k karma I had). Hybrid build.

Average damage is around 18k, tops at 28k to light armor when all hit crit, that’s in PvE. I don’t run GS in WvW.

Asura = Smurfs with warp drive in their kitten (just look at their running animation and compare it to distance they travel).

I would way Queensdale is best starting area.

Vayra.3290:

pEEtrs.4320:

DancingPenguins.9875:

Booler.6598:

shaktiboi.5194:

I don’t know the Subject Alpha encounter, so perhaps there the group is constrained to a very small area when fighting?

No the problem with the alpha fight is about every 5 – 10 seconds he will put a circle around every player regardless of where they standing , and if your anything less than tanky it will generally one shot you . if you are in mele range of this boss he will not use his aoe circles on you only another couple making people downing in mele range of you/boss easy to pickup , anything else is suicidal at least

Alternatively, everybody can casually walk out of the circles and keep on hitting the boss with whatever they like. That kinda works too.

Yea, only problem of this approach is, if you fail once u get downed. Some else who is not close to you have to run to you to ress you. In the time he needs to reach you, you already have another AoE above you so u’re probably dead (or if he insist on ressing ya, he gets downed too). Same goes for prisons, if group is spread, everyone just wastes so much precious time to run to prison and then smash it (sure, range specced characters can break it from distance, but you don’t meet many ranged specced toons.

Above said can be negated if everyone stays in close range of SA doing whatever they usually do. AoEs / Cleaves break prisons fast. No prob ressing, because everbody is in ress range.

It’s a huge fiery thing hanging above you for a few seconds, it’s not hard to move out of. Subject Alpha is not a hard fight in any possible definition of the word, whether you do it ranged or melee.

Alright, I though you were talking about the ice thing. I don’t count the fire one as dangerous nor the earth one
Problematic is the ice AoE and my reply is aimed at that AoE, it’s much easier to do it if every just stay close to each other, not to mention that AoE are in one place instead of around whole room. Unfortunately quite lot of people just isn’t able to do the dodges (still bothers my mind how hard it can be to count one-two in your head and press dodge on three).

DancingPenguins.9875:

Booler.6598:

shaktiboi.5194:

I don’t know the Subject Alpha encounter, so perhaps there the group is constrained to a very small area when fighting?

No the problem with the alpha fight is about every 5 – 10 seconds he will put a circle around every player regardless of where they standing , and if your anything less than tanky it will generally one shot you . if you are in mele range of this boss he will not use his aoe circles on you only another couple making people downing in mele range of you/boss easy to pickup , anything else is suicidal at least

Alternatively, everybody can casually walk out of the circles and keep on hitting the boss with whatever they like. That kinda works too.

Yea, only problem of this approach is, if you fail once u get downed. Some else who is not close to you have to run to you to ress you. In the time he needs to reach you, you already have another AoE above you so u’re probably dead (or if he insist on ressing ya, he gets downed too). Same goes for prisons, if group is spread, everyone just wastes so much precious time to run to prison and then smash it (sure, range specced characters can break it from distance, but you don’t meet many ranged specced toons.

Above said can be negated if everyone stays in close range of SA doing whatever they usually do. AoEs / Cleaves break prisons fast. No prob ressing, because everbody is in ress range.

From my POV at CoE is: I can take whatever class wish to join if (and after yesterday only if) the guy will be able to dodge SAs attacks. I don’t care if he uses ranged weapon or not, all I want him to do is to stay close to SA so he could be helped without hassle (and he could help others without hassle).

So the lesson I learned is: Observe how people in group do in first two or three encounters (in case of SA, 1st fight with him), leave if they have no clue / don’t listen.
Above is based on my terrible PUG experience yesterday. Silent group which didn’t uderstood that being spread all over the SAs room basically means that u’re asking for wipe (if I didn’t need other guy to get me out of prison when it happens, I would probably try to solo SA and dont give a funk about rest of group). Not to say it was 1st time I saw someone consistently tried to walk out from circles instead of dodging them (didn’t work most of time)

dank.3680:

xKedge.5493:

dank.3680:

skupuz.6940:

Slamz.5376:

Ragnar.4257:

I play warrior, thief and elementalist in WvW, warrior most of the time now. I can’t think that I’ve ever lost a 1v1 with a thief while on my warrior. Sometimes they escape, and sometimes I have to back off, but never lost.

One of the chief points of the thread is not 1v1, but the ability to stop a thief from destroying siege engines.

With their ability to constantly stealth, it’s virtually impossible to keep them off of siege. The best you can do is AE the area and get them to move away but that’s only going to keep them off for about 5 seconds, and then they’ll be back.

Net result is always the same:
10+ siege defenders are running around swinging wildly at the air while the thief pops around slowly killing all the siege in the field. 1 thief can still be there dealing damage long after a group of 5 bunker elementalists (or any other class or combo) would have been killed.

Invisibility is simply the best “tank” ability in the game, and it’s on the highest DPS class.

An ele can block trebs from hitting the door/wall. Whats the point again?

It takes multiple Ele’s coordinating on VOIP to actually prevent the wall/gate from going down. It takes 1 thief to kill the siege, I think that’s the point.

I don’t know how in your server.. you don’t get punish but in my server when i do that to a good guild. I be spam with everything they got. Its nearly impossible getting 1-100% siege just by yourself and in case you do it.. Theres probably gonna be more than 1 cata.. most likely will be 2-4 cata + treb + arrowcart/ballista.

Gl with all the mesmer pulls and warrior/guardian hammers.

Good luck hitting me with all that when I have near endless dodges with acrobatics, vigor on heal, vigor from steal and endurance regen food. And like I said before, if I do get hit, shadowstep to the nearest noob and get a stealth and run around CND the clueless till I have my “oh shiat” cd’s again.

Oh btw I’ve played on pretty much every server.. Including multiple T1 servers.

The funny thing about it is, the more ppl there is, the harder it is for a class like ele to do anything.. The more people there is, the easier it is for a thief.

I don’t need good luck to hit acro thief, thief was my 1st character and I tried lot of build (PvE and sPvP), so I pretty much know this class in and out. All I need to is to watch your steps and hit when you’re vulnerable. Then you’ll be eating dirt after 3rd swing of my hammer. Oh and please, use SR, it’s very nice way how to tell me where you are and where should I land my Burst

Sure there are good thieves which is alway welcome fight on any of my characters, but 95% of thieves don’t utilize their class to it’s maximal potential.

To the rest of discussion:

1) PLEASE STOP USING BORKED CULLING FOR UNCALLED STEALTH NERF! I have to add that latest patch made this lot better, now I can see thieves right after their opener (maybe not exactly at that time, but it wont take more then 0.5s for them to appear).

2) SR does not grant 14s of invis, as far as I know, last time I played my thief, it was still capped at 10s.

3) Only advice I can give to guys who can’t deal with thieves is: Make one, level it, try builds, learn how to counter them. If you can’t do that, stop kittening about it on forums.

Personally I stopped playing thief, it’s not bad class, but I tried War and I like it much more… I’m not going back

P.S. Even two stab / venom thieves can’t take down one war (who is mainly in zerk gear, but not glass build), while I took both down right after they tried SR to escape (probably their biggest mistake in that fight, after the the fact they should have run when their opening combo didn’t take me into lower parts of my HP pool).

No it wont. But I agree that groups which take time to kill everything should be rewarded (thinking about bonus XP for quests in DDO as good example).

Rackhir Tanelorn.9123:

laokoko.7403:

ya I mean “Engineer, 2 Necros, Ranger and an Ele” That is how you get through cof path 2.

If you have cough cough warrior it’ll be harder. Most warrior use hundred blade for aoe. But now they can’t tank 100 mob and have knockdown on them.

No if you have Stability/Control/Tanking/Support Warriors you are fine… if you have 100 Blades all Zerker Signet/MF Warriors you will die miserably…

As you should

Dear sir, we don’t need to tank dead mobs! We will just shred the mobs so fast, they wouldn’t be able to spawn fast enough to satisfy our bloodlust. You know, Balanced stance / Shake it off is all any war need there.

Coming from guy who has nearly full berserker (just 3 jewelery slots are cavalier) warrior (using MF/GF food in CoF).

Ideal group for CoF (and pretty much every other dungeon) is still the same: 1x Guard, 4x War. All berserker. With group such as this, you can make all paths of any dungeon (except Arah) during one food buff.

DeathPanel.8362:

Note, I have full exotic everything with sigils and runes sets.

So did my team, except for 1 person, and all were 80 of course.

Mesmer, War, War, Guard, Ele.

We failed 8+ times on defend magg. We caught on right away about the assassin but that wasn’t the main issue.

The main issue was the tons of mobs with knockdown attacks eventually overwhelming us.

It seems that the path now requires heavy or all aoe specced team to succeed, which is bad design.

Sorry to say it, but you guys were doing something seriously wrong, with group setup as you had I think one or two guys could go AFK and you should still complete event without problems. Let’s look at your group composition:

2x War = Massive AoE damage (if they use one handers and refuse to carry one GS for times where GS is needed, then they are just bad without hope), self stability and lot of stun breaks to get up from floor.
Guard = stability for everyone? AoE damage?
Ele = Another massive AoE damage dealer
Mesmer = just cherry on top

Clearly L2P issue there and that’s why I like the event, smart guys will learn how to do it properly, rest will not do the path (good for me, no need to lecture pugs every single time).

I went there with couple of casual friends (they made it to exotic gear, but don’t have much time to play, so no leetzor-uber-skillerz). And after initial shock that it doesn’t look like we used to, which caused our initial fail. We did it 2nd time without Magg even being touched (and I consider it actually too easy now).

ad WP update: YAY! Finally, very much needed (and actually something I love about Fractals is now even in dungeons).

ad Orr update: Haven’t spend much time in Orr since update, but I really like the updated karma vendors (I finally got my exotic Cavalier accessories and back slot), not speaking about jewelery box, WTF is this for? Bought few to test it and all I got was Liquid Karma pots

Ad updated CoF: New event is kinda cool (event itself is much better then previous event), but I think the mobs are ridiculously weak now, two swing of my sword and thrash is dead and the assassin takes one 100B and he’s done. What could help is if the assassin wasn’t visible (not just blurry, but Thief like invisible) until he’s at Magg (as it happened in my group, he never made it near the Magg), then he could do something like 5s preparation (so group will have 5s window of opportunity to kill him), then hit the Magg. Also wouldn’t hurt if the Charr archers actually shoot at Magg.

Oh and if this is gonna be read by some dev, I have small request: Please adjust Maggs AI a bit in the search for magmacyte (not sure about spelling, but you know what I mean). It’s happening more often then not, that he for no reason aggroes 3-5 mobs, then it takes ages for them to kill him. If we go down to him and kill mobs and ress him, he immediately aggroes something else (even at start of cavern, while we’re at the end of it). While all we want him to do is to run to stone.

Here’s my build:

http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-sg-7-0-NKFO0Y4kL-60;9;4ETE-94;049A1;34;04-F0Iw

Armor / weaps are berserker, lower jewelery slot are berserker and upper jewelery slots are Cavalier with emerald jewels (not sure if I put emerald jewels into all slots). I use life steal food (Omnomberry pie). So I didn’t sacrificed that much damage, but I can definitely survive much better then full zerk. If u want to spend money on sup sigil of strength (on crit might), then replace sigil of Air with it.

With this, you can die only if you don’t have mobs to hit Otherwise it’s usually one 100B from low health to full health.

ad 1st question: I usually kill one right away and that back to the ledges (messing up AI with jumps between them), if i see new acolytes, I whirlwind/charge to then and slice them fast, then repeat the ledges stuff.

ad 2nd question: Dome defense it’s just matter of 100B with pie and runing in circles around the brazier (mobs usually follow rather then hitting you through it) when 100B is on CD. For oh-crap moments, you have endure pain. Or swap to axe and cleave their kitten img src="/include/images/smilies/smile.png" />

This build work basically in any dungeon, only difference is that for example for AC, I swap endure pain for stability stance, rest remains same. Oh and I also carry longbow around for times when u need range.

Not only that, this will happen even if u try to pick up banner while moving, but there are other threads about this already.

I recently started war too, after I leveled thief and necro up to 80.

I must now say that Warriors are kings of PvE, no other class can basically melt everything in sight up to 6 levels above character level (even group events).

To your question: No, there’s no point in having Axe in off hand. After some testing, I found setup which pretty much makes PvE quick easy mode for wars. Get Axe / Horn in one slot, GS in 2nd. Get healing signet, signet for cond removal, stability signet, precision standard and signet of rage and you’re all set for anything.

Trait for GS and signets (rest is kinda optional). Get life steal food. Use one rune for swiftness duration (I use 2x Air for that and 4x Divinity for better crit numbers).

- Perma swiftness will make running around less tedious.
– I found nothing better for adrenalin buildup then well placed 100B, as others said, don’t use GS burts, it smells. Swap to Axe and eviscerate (ait bad to use all CDs while you’re on axe/horn and swap back to GS).
– 100B is also one way how to get 25 stacks of might in 3s.

+1 for Linux support, if this happens, I think I’ll be finally able to discard that piece of Malware from Redmond once and for all on last of my machines where it run (my gaming machine)

I think ANet could go in same direction as CCP did with EvE. You can try the same, I imagine it will not cost much resources (and if I knew something like that is going to happen, I might spend more money on gems).

I run AC quite often (easy money if u ask me) and I have yet to encounter this exploit. Haven’t seen it, don’t have idea why exploit such easy bosses.

Oh well and if I get kicked out of group, no biggie, I’ll find another one and put exploiters on black list.

Oh and btw. what’s stopping you from forming your own group which will not use such exploit?

Vasham.2408:

HiddenNick.7206:

Vasham.2408:

HiddenNick.7206:

FourthVariety.5463:

Interesting game mechanics need to be programmed on a per boss basis. High HP are just one value to edit.

Part of it is the lack of trinity. If you have a trinity system, it can be rubber stamped onto every encounter and no matter how boring it is, the encounter retains the trinity mechanics of players being cross-dependent. GW2 does not have this option. While the game has some bosses who have interesting game mechanics, there are far too many to expect a custom programmer’s job be done on every single one of them.

Trinity mechanic is only interesting from healers perspective (and tanks in far smaller degree). Others just stand in one spot and hit all their skills as fast as they can… From their perspective it is far less interesting then Gw2 system because they can’t die.

Have you ever actually played a real MMO?

What do you mean by “real MMO”?

One with combat that doesn’t consist of mindlessly blowing cooldowns, or one with boss encounters that aren’t just trash mobs with ridiculous health pools, or one with real PVE progression that’s an actual challenge.

You know, one not like Guild Wars 2.

Ummmm, there is some game like that? Each and every single themepark MMO boils down to mindless button mashing, it’s as simple as that.

I mean I played most of MMO up to this day for at least 1 month (except WoW, I just can’t stand stupidity and simplicity of that game) and there’s only one king of this market, it’s EvE. Downside of that game is, it’s sandbox and it has so freaking steep learning curve, that most people give up before they actually see it’s true beauty.

What I like most on GW2 is fact, there’s no holy trinity crap like everywhere else. So no requirement to have a tank + healer in each and every freakin group! With exception of DDO, they have holy trinity, but it’s not required in 99% of content (we used to run in group of Wizard, purely offensive FvS (so not much healing, basically only self-heals) and rogue.
Also the fact that you can beat most of PvE content without necessity to grind for ages to get items of better “color” which will give you chance to do next part of content (and without it, you’re boned). What I mean, here I found game, where Skill > Gear.

Because I don’t really find holy trinity entertaining. It’s like 1 guy standing at boss, mashing 2 aggro abilities till they fall asleep. Then there’s guy who presses 1,2,3,4,5 and repeat to heal everyone (while he basically stands in one place and watches only health bars instead of fight), then there’s rest of guys, who mashes DPS abilities while standing in back of boss. You guys find that entertaining? I feel sad for you.

GW2 is 2nd MMO ever, where I find PvE entertaining, yet it’s only glimpse of what it could be (I wish ANet played DDO for some time, to get their best ideas and implement them into GW2, superb camera system anyone?).

P.S. I’m not saying DDO is still good or best game ever, but it was amazing for it’s 1st 3-4 years of life, then Turbine started to ruin it and they still continue to ruin it with each and every patch. Yet, their combat system is still best in games I played, GW2 is closing to it, but lacks major features.

Well this is exactly what pisses me most on GW2. ANet tried to make combat more FPS-like, yet they didn’t do a kitten about controls.

All I can say about this is: ANet, please download Dungeons and Dragons Online, check how their camera system / targetting system works (especially ability to lock cursor into 3rd person game with crosshair) and implement it for GW2, it will be awsome and it will sort lot of problems. Oh and while you’re at it, check how to do proper control customization, GW2 is like aplha version in these regards.

I’ve been experimenting with different build lately (after I hit 80), when I learned that my leveling backstab build wasn’t really that good for dungeons. After few attempts on condition thief and realization that I don’t like condition thief that much, I came up with this build:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fYAQNAoYVlUmCOHdy9E+JFxWhdyzwoI1/AZ7UcVrC;TkAqgM6I0xmjLIZOLLGZMJA

The gear I use: Armor + weapons are berserker’s, jewels are berserker with Exquisite emeralds…

Playstyle consists of lot of tumbling around mob and pretty much being perma revealed. If played properly, I can keep myself up around 15 stacks of might and if there’s another person giving might, then I stay on full 25 stacks most of time. When stacked up, there’s really no skill on my skill bars that’s not worth using (even LDB does around 100 per tick, which is very nice sustained damage).

I was thinking about other weapon sets, but in the end I’m going to stay D/D for one simple reason. I play with friend of mine who plays Ele and with D/D + SB I have access to every possible combo finisher in game and he provides some cheesy combo fields for me to utilize

I’m just thinking if it’s worth to keep Thrill of the Crime or if I should swap it for Uncatchable. TotC sounds better, because it’s 2 stacks of might and fury, which could result in even more stacks of might. yet, caltrops cripple enemies and will do some nice additional damage with lot of might stacks.

What do you guys think?

P.S. These funked up forums can’t handle line wrapping in URLs, so copy paste link to build.

ZLE.8293:

I will provide 1 reason from my point of view.I am condition thief.With no swap CD i would equip S/D+P/X and with considerable ini regen which my build posses i will prety much perma-perform the following combo: Infiltrator’s Strike-C&D-Dodge-Swap-Sneak attack-Swap-Rinse and Repeat.ANyone who have played P/D condition thief knows what will be like….

And you just posted one reason why we should have same weapon swap limitations just like everybody else. No cool down on swap would just make thief ridiculously overpowered (if traited properly and with right sigils in weapons).

1st reason: On-weapon-swap sigils.

2nd reason: Quick pockets.

Do I have to provide more reasons?

Tulisin.6945:

While ending fights quickly with burst is extremely effective in PvP, I don’t think relying on Mug, a 40s~ cooldown, is a sound solution in PvE. If you enjoy the playstyle, great, you can really do whatever you want in open-world PvE (I’ve run sword/nothing in Orr for the lulz) and do fine, but power-based D/D doesn’t really excel at most PvE situations. Telling a struggling thief to go with a build like that is likely to make them more frustrated.

That’s why I added that P.S. in the end. Because when I bought the game, I ended up in the very same palce as OP and I rolled necro for PvE, because I was dead with thief quite fast (and it felt like weak PvE class). Later on after few weeks of serious PvP I realized, that I was doing it wrong with thief and started one again. Since then I wonder why should I go back to my necro, it just can’t kill single targets / packs of mobs as fast and pretty much untouched as my thief can.

I wouldn’t say power / crit build won’t excel in most PvE situations. Only situation I’ve yet to encounter (to test how this build works there) is dungeon. I haven’t done any yet. My experience is that power/crit build excels in most PvE situation because it kill so freakin fast that most mobs attack maybe once before they die (and you always have SB when things are getting hairy). Tell me wchich class can go to location 5 levels higher then current char level and do events / stuff without any problem what so ever? I’ve done that, because I was too lazy to switch to different map just to get me few levels (sure they hit bit harder if they managed to hit me).

The major thing every Thief should learn (and what I learned through some serious tpvp) is use of his insane mobility. 2nd most important skill every Thief needs is to master Shortbow. Since you can solo most of gold bosses (if they dont spam AoEs), sure, it takes a while, but melee bosses can’t hit you, while you bomb them with cluster bombs.

Change your utilities:
I run with speed signet (the passive is so cool in PvE), shadowstep and shadow refuge (get refuge asap). Get Mug asap.

Playstyle is usual hit and run, so u do mug/cnd/stab combo, then either heartseeker to finish mob or DB to bleed the pack (and evade what’s going to hit you). Also dont forget that you have Shortbow in secondary slot, which is AoE king for Thieves.

I dont think i’ll be playing any other build then burst (all equip I have is power/precision), it’s just imo waste of time to try to play thief as condition (or whatever), you just dont kill fast enough

P.S. Fact is that I 1st played like 200 games in PvP as glass Thief and then I decided to try some PvE and since then I find PvE pretty boring and easy (much easier then on my necro).

I’d suggest to go full burst.

I leveled my thief from level 1 to current lvl 55 with pretty much same build as the build I’m playing in PvP (backstab burst) and it’s far too easy to do anything. Even playstyle is pretty much the same, Mug+CnD+Backstab for single target awesomeness, SB for large scale AoE fun.
Only harder part is to learn when you should go melee and when it’s time to pull SB out.

I never really had problem with getting my stabs out, 3s of cloak is enough, since you should be near mob anyway, it’s not that problematic to get to his back (and even if it is … well it’s one backstab and we’re talking about PvE, where u have plenty of time to setup another backstab). There’s no collision detection, so u can just run through mob…

Very well written post OP.

/signed

I originally didn’t even want to buy GW2 (I was expecting what I’m now experiencing), but friends talked me into it so I said to myself: Heck, it’s pay once play whenever you want, if it’s gonna be last nail into MMO coffin for me, so be it.

Yet here I am and here’s how my usual evening goes:
1) Login
2) Play few hotjoins, then get utterly bored, because maps are just not balanced for 8v8.
3) Stare at my traits for few mins, thinking about some build I could try.
4) Log off and do something else.

Sure, I tried to do free tourneys, but as many other said, it’s not fun to get rolled by premades. I don’t mind losing as long as the match is good and I feel I learned something, but when you get rolled, only thing you learn is to stop playing tourneys.

Let’s look on other options I have? Hotjoins, well, considering that it’s 8v8 on maps designed for 5v5, it’s not fun either, you won’t learn anything when you get rolled by 6 people. Count in the fact, that there’s one map in rotation which shouldn’t even exist (yes, I’m looking at you sharks) or at least not with sharks (WTF are doing regular PvE mobs in PvP map??), you’re down to join different server every time this map comes up.

Alright, we tried two things in this, so called e-sporty competitive PvP MMO, what do we have next? Nothing. Oh right, I can do PvE, which bores me to death since Lineage 2. I can do WvW, which is traditional “PvP” where better equipment wins the fight. Been there, seen it, not like it.

I’m not going to rewrite again most of stuff already written by OP and other posters, perhaps one question (already asked in this thread):

Are you guys at ANet really the same guys who designed GW1?
If so, why you did not use ladder / matchmaking / GvG / Arenas from GW1 and make them even better in GW2?

Bit of off topic: ANet devs, please consider hiring someone else for GUI design. Absolutely worst UI I’ve ever seen in “modern” MMOs. Look at Warhammer how proper UI is done.