Guild Wars 2

I’d argue the NPCs are good for testing, because we have no way of knowing what ‘traits’ SPvP opponents have or what stat ‘amulets’ they are wearing (I’d bet on Soldier’s).

Damage was similar on the golems, for whatever that’s worth.

I can see 4k from a berserker build. Surviving an encounter with another glass cannon becomes exponentially more difficult, though. I prefer to outlast my opponents if at all possible.

Leads to some boring bunker vs. bunker battles though. First to get reinforcements wins!

I have never played an SPvP (tournament) match as a mesmer and made it through it without dying at least once.

I have 19 matches under my belt on my thief alt and it hasn’t been killed once.

Let’s address the 900 pound gorilla first.

Pyroatheist.9031:

4k per strike on a bunker

Valkyrie’s amulet, rampager’s jewel. Swordsman hits for 2.5k-3.1k. Are we playing the same game? It’s 4:30 AM and you have me logging into Heart of the Mists to check my memory. Thanks. ;p

Edit: 1285 per strike against the Elementalist NPC. My terrible guess was totally influenced by your ‘4k’. :P

Edit: 2200 crits against the Necromancer after 8 vulnerability stacks. New high!

Edit: Pic.

Forums don’t get anything nerfed.

Having said that… it makes sense that it’s mostly thieves who complain about Phantasm mesmers and BM rangers as ‘pet’ AI is best able to find their target after a stealth-and-flee and I am greatly amused at your plight.

Legacy.7360:

Just too reiterate what the OP said, 5-9k Dmg from a AI… is absurd Anet.

If you want to talk about “absurd” mechanics, let’s talk about initiative and stealth. There are plenty of ways to deal 3-9k damage. My warrior alt in Masterwork gear and weapons reaches as high 9k with HB. My condition damage ranger stacks poison, bleeding and burning and melts everything in his path using traps and Entangle.

Over here we have Mug>Backstab>CnD = 3~ seconds of insta-gib trolling, each skill capable of greater than 3k and as high as 12k if your opponent isn’t stacking toughness and/or vitality (not including the auto-attack and Heartseeker follow-up — oh, and don’t try to get away, they do bonus damage from behind/the side, auto-face, AND leap toward you, and this can be done 3-4 times in succession with only 1 second between attacks).

Other professions are forced to play defensively while thieves are afforded the ability to use berserker equipment/trinkets and deal incredibly fast, high damage with no penalty when the profession is played well.

Since I’m forced to use toughness/vitality on everything but my thief, I do. Thieves no longer kill me without a friend around. However I can rarely kill a thief unless the player isn’t very good. The good ones always escape.

Perfectly balanced.

I never understood why it isn’t possible to do this to PVE ‘trash’ mobs. Kudos on the slow-mo Banish in the beginning… and, of course, the choice of music. lol.

Being called a troll for having a sense of humor and posting something that was obviously not serious except to those lacking any common sense (or those who play thief; not mutually exclusive, however) aside…

I have a feeling that ANet is saving an Elite Phantasm for the first expansion. I’d also like to see an elite mantra, but I have no idea what could be done with that. Grants stability, quickness and protection? Okay self, I’m sold.

Sergoros.4398:

Not sure if trolling or just naive…

Are those my only two choices? We have these things called “jokes” where I come from. Pay extra-close attention to the last bit. If you read all of the forums, you’ll understand.

Illusionary Thief
Cast time: Instant. Cooldown: 6 seconds.

• Applies stealth to itself between all attacks.
• Uses only cloak and dagger.
• Hits for 6,000 – 12,000 damage.

Balanced because phantasms do not have very much health, after all.

Nik Rane.6431:

RIP in peaces dragonwagon

The prevailing psychology of the players who started on Sanctum of Rall is to equal the threat it’s under at any given time. We neither have fun being steamrolled nor steamrolling amid unfair competition. I personally prefer to patrol SoR borderlands alone.

Most of the our ‘militia’ was drawn to Wv3 by BG (and on a rare occasion or two, JQ) because of all the boastful trolling on forums and in-game. If the ‘bear’ isn’t being poked (and quite hard at that), it’s content to sleep, so to speak.

I do need 176 more badges for some new ascended rings though.

Dub.1273:

Mesmers single-skill damage (without reflect) is the second worst in this game.

ftfy.

We can perform some of the highest burst combos in the game.
Key word: combos.

We have to set it up after a higher number of steps than most professions using multiple skills and traits.

It’s also a very telegraphed burst combo. You’ll always see it coming.

It’s also very easy to avoid. A single dodge will get you out of it every time.

There’s also a large number of other ways to avoid it. I’ve had people avoid my burst just by backpedaling. Very irritating. ;p

Provided it doesn’t get any worse, I’ll be sticking it out with greatsword and sword/focus… but greatsword still has the same problem it’s had for months: the phantasm is broken. For a damage skill, on a power-focused weapon, to deal only 4-8k damage (when it isn’t hitting for 800-1200) on a 20 second cooldown, while other professions can deal 8-12k on a lower cooldown (some can even spam these attacks ahem) seems wrong somehow.

On another note, Mind Stab should be a blast finisher. Then it might be useful and not just something you use when everything else is on cooldown. Enemies love it when I root myself for .5 seconds, only remove 1 boon (if any) and only deal 800-1200 damage, it seems.

1) Knowing what enemies do
2) Knowing the game’s counters to those things
3) Effectively applying this knowledge

= Elitist?

I thought it was more about having a soapbox-standing, glory-loving, superiority-complex-having attitude about playing well.

‘Competent’ better describes what you’re looking for (OP). I hope.

…I wonder if Stealth will have a viable counter one day.

I personally almost never run with ‘blobs’ and BG/JQ’s blobs of 10+ are always around the next corner to make me pay for that. -_-

That’s just one of the many problems stealth introduces in a game like this. If you’re invisible, and you can’t be made to be visible, stealth is a way to position-hack all over a map without being spotted/reported.

randomfightfan.4091:

lol, someone obv has never played a thief before

I do play a thief — it was my second alt — and posts as lengthy as yours are SCREAMING fear of a nerf. It’s coming no matter how many ways thieves try to explain their way out of it… and my Mug does hit for 3-4k. You must not be taking into account all the might-stacking thief can do with stealth/venoms/boon stealing. If I don’t have at least 10 stacks of might, I’m not doing it right.

Mizu.9387:

Does this need a solution? If we clash with a mob that stacked retal, we immediatly hold off our big AoE’s until the 4-5 seconds have passed or our necros removed it. I think the problem lies in people buttonmashing too much, not paying attention to buffs or how they take damage.

I wholeheartedly welcome and support your suggestion to revert the confusion nerf.

edit: Then again, ANet only reverts thief nerfs.

Day-old baguette is the deadliest bread of all.

Ryuujin.8236:

Practically the entire mesmer grid, especially the domination line, is a joke harkening back to beta. It includes a whole row of minor traits dedicated to interruption that NOBODY uses.

Gems include:

• Empowered Illusions: Illusions deal 15% more damage – but clones haven’t dealt damage since BWE2
• Furious Interruption: Gain 4 seconds of fury when you interrupt – this is a grandmaster trait… no… just, no.
• Bountiful Interruption: Gain a random boon when you interrupt – also a grandmaster trait! Gosh, better not stack this with Furious Interruption!

This is another hilarious bit of mesmerism that has always irked me.

Halting Strike : Deal damage when interrupting a foe. – Deals 150 damage and does NOT scale significantly with Power.

Meanwhile…

Mug : Deal damage and gain life when stealing. – Heals for 2,000 and hits for 3-4k.

I can’t decide whether it was more powerful before or after the recent change to Mug.

#imbathief

After months/years of active use, Square-Enix started sending cease and desist letters to people who produced hacks for Final Fantasy XI such as “FFXItool” and “MrArgus” and were successful for the most part. NCSoft and/or ANet could easily do the same thing.

That’s not to say that there aren’t still hacks for FFXI (which I no longer play), but those they did attempt to shut down, they did.

…add 25 stacks of confusion to that list as an in-game representation of how stupid your character feels for “standing in the fire.”

I honestly hope ArenaNet’s writers/game designers read these sort of threads without shaking their heads.

Roughly the same activation time as Heartseeker, then.
Wait, those can’t be compared. Into the Void doesn’t deal 7-12k damage.

It’s a fairly safe bet that Linux users the world over wouldn’t mind a client that isn’t officially supported. Give me 60 FPS and I’m good to go. ;p

Funny stuff. Reminds me of the videos made by the host of the Relics of Orr podcast.

NightElf RaidPro 1
NightElf RaidPro 2

Host was a GW1 player. These videos mock common complaints by bad players transitioning to Guild Wars 2 from WoW. Relics of Orr was my favorite podcast for a long time. Wish it had kept going steady.

Doomdesire.9365:

Also don’t focus on one player, focus on attacking everyone at once.

…this explains a lot.

Phoenixfudge.5290:

First, Into the Void has an instant cast-time and can immediately be activated after setting down Temporal Curtain.

The ‘tell’ for Temporal Curtain being placed has already been explained. The mesmer motions from right to left as if drawing a line on the ground. The animation itself takes approximately .5 seconds. Again, bearing in mind that it’s one of the only counters for stealth abuse, it probably shouldn’t have ANY tell. At least, not until stealth can’t be permanent or incurs a penalty or penalties such as reduced movement speed.

Phoenixfudge.5290:

It also happens to have a max range of 1500 range, 900 from setting the curtain and 600 from the radius in which Into the Void pulls. Instant casting with no tell? AOE pull with max range of 1500? That’s quite a powerful snare you got there.

Thief is already near-impossible to catch. One profession has one way to slow you down for one second. Who’s crying, again?

Phoenixfudge.5290:

Do you see a common trait amongst the skills you listed? All those other CC skills you’ve listed have a short range. Most are in melee range. The ones that don’t will have a clear tell (such as the Throw Mine) . Also, you listed Tornado which is an elite, thanks for the laughs.

They’re all no-tell removal from shadow refuge, and oddly enough, Throw Mine is the most similar to Temporal Curtain.

• You see the curtain.
• You see the mine.

• The curtain pulls you.
• The mine launches you.

• Both are ranged.

…and I listed two elites, thank you.

marnick.4305:

The boon of windows is simplicity. It works out of the box. That’s simply not true for linux.

Right on all points in your post… except for the notion that Linux does not work ‘out of the box.’ Perhaps you haven’t given it a chance in a few years.

Once Linux installed on most people’s computers (I do this a lot for friends and family), it works brilliantly without any configuration. Various Linux distribution releases since 2008 (or so) have actually been easier to install than any version of Windows ever was — and I date back to Windows 3.11, when I was 12 or so. :P

A later post suggested that Linux is considered difficult by novice users because they have to install it themselves… and I concur. That’s often the only scary part of recommending Linux to someone (and again, you have to do the same thing with installing Windows — and it’s actually less clear about where to install Windows without destroying data).

I always have to help them understand partitioning and help them to avoid destroying all of their data (photos, videos, documents, etc.) Other than that, it’s flawless.

…and before anyone asks (via PM) again about which Linux distro is best for new users… any of them. The user experience is dependent on the desktop environment. Some prefer GNOME 2, some GNOME 3, some Unity, some KDE, etc.

I usually go with Kubuntu. The K Desktop Environment, configured to look and function a bit like Windows 7 or XP, along with Ubuntu’s software repositories is usually slam dunk.

It does seem like being penalized for spending $10 on a gem store item, doesn’t it? You can’t even interrupt the animation.

If the public at large knew what computer hobbyists/enthusiasts know about computers, both Apple and Microsoft would be out of business. Random thought, and definitely true.

The only Microsoft product I own right now is Windows 7 Professional. It was a free download thanks to taking a course at a local community college (TestOut’s “CompTIA Linux+ Certification” course). The only reason I bothered to download it is to play Guild Wars 2 at greater than 19 FPS. Not sure what changed since the early beta. Beta clients 1 and 2 ran very well on Linux via WINE… meh.

Give it another 20-30 years. Linux adoption is growing at an exponential rate. It’s funny that the desktop PC is going to be GNU/Linux’s final conquest considering the desktop PC is what it was originally designed for.

The OP — a thief, of course — forgot include all of the following skills which also need to be nerfed because they all push, pull, or launch foes without requiring a target… and he’ll never have to suffer the consequences of depending on stealth again.

Subsequently… I have to ask: Why does it seem like mesmers are the only ones that remove thieves from Shadow Refuge when so many options are available?

Shield of Absorption
Rifle Butt
Staggering Blow
Magnetic Inversion
Illusionary Wave
Throw Mine
Wave of Light
Chilling Wind
Air Blast
Banish
Updraft
Stomp
Thump
Big Ol’ Bomb
Stomp
Tornado

DeadlySynz.3471:

This is where the problems with thieves arrives. Take any other class and turn them into glass cannons, they deal huge damage (some obviously bigger than others), but receive big damage in return. Thieves.. not so much.. they’ll just hit you for 10-20k before you can even react.. if they don’t down you, they’ll just stealth out, reset fight and repeat as needed.

IDDQD.

lunyboy.8672:

Ask an Guard or a Necro when the last time they put up a 10K+ crit. An an engineer, when I roll completely glass, I can’t get anywhere near the DPS a thief can do with a “tanky” version of their build, but have none of the stealth, combat movement, or massive access to blinds to prevent me from cracking like a eggshell.

When I’m in my ‘full glass’ set — only in PvE — my phantasmal berserker sometimes doesn’t bug and lands all hits for around 7k~ :O! That is, if I haven’t been blinded… and the foe isn’t invulnerable… and the foe doesn’t dodge or evade… and the phantasm isn’t killed instantly if it does spawn… and the phantasm isn’t blinded… and if my enemy doesn’t evade… or move… but, I mean, that’s pretty good!

Play to win, win or lose. Whether it’s “just a game” or real life, if this isn’t your attitude, start shopping now for a comfortable rocking chair and a house with a big front porch to watch sunsets from.

[uncensored clip]

I saw it after I posted, Sebrent. I also play a thief, and being a sane and rational person, the only ‘nerf’ I can recall is pistol whip.

Even the few damage reductions listed may be called ‘fixes’ by other professions who can still be two- or three-shotted in under <4 seconds (thanks to Quickness as a utility skill) despite having over 2K Toughness, 3K Armor and 20K Health (leaving many confused bunker guardians lying on the ground confused)… but that would only be as fair as referring to bug fixes as nerfs.

Many of the “nerfs” are glitch-fixes. If you’re going to try to prove a point, don’t be stupid about it.

Mogar.9216:

You realize in the real world I can’t just walk up to a world champ in ANY sport and demand a title shot. Number 1 ranking is earned in every sport by fighting your way up the ladder. Otherwise the world champ title would have no meaning.

Brock, and his bro, Dana, disagree.

[I do not.]

MaXi.3642:

whats wrong with it? when a guy with 0 games played defeat world champion in box, he become a new champion, is that wrong? here if you defeat much better players than you are, you gain more rating and become better rated fast, works good imo

Brock agrees.

Jacklo.4230:

I don’t get it. The poster above openly admits that he can easily survive against one thief, but wants to be able to tackle a team of thieves. The most common complaint in this thread is that some people can’t deal with the fact that a thief might actually get away.

Are people really so upset about losing a badge? You still won the fight if the other player had to run.

I guess I have to copy this into every thread.

This argument in a world vs. world context makes no sense whatsoever.

Basically what you’re saying is that if a thief wins, I have broken armor and must return to spawn and run back to my objective.

If I win, the thief survives and runs and/or teleports 2000+ range away to get out of sight and continues about his business.

“Balanced!”

If I could organize Wv3 all by myself such that all of SoR operated in 15-20 man squads and covered the entire map day and night…

They keep the moderators busy, scootshoot.

Final exam #1 in the morning. #2 Tuesday morning. #3 Wednesday evening. See you Thursday night, Wv3…

Reborn Grijmblade.2396:

Leave thieves alone, and create a counter to stealth.
To maintain balance, every mechanic must have a counter.
If no counter is present, you will be left with an overpowered mechanism.

Woah, woah… careful with the common sense, Grijmblade. Bandwagon thieves everywhere will take to the forums and have your profession nerfed.

In all seriousness, this is what I’ve been saying from the beginning. I never understood why stealth isn’t removable by skills that remove boons.

As much as I argue against the constant availability of stealth (to thieves, that is), I’d argue just as much that activating stealth should break and interrupt channeled attacks. :\

Winning: YES! WE ARE THE BEST! NO-ONE WILL EVER BEAT US!
Losing: I never really cared anyway.

— every bandwagon sports fan/player/competitive gamer ever

Master of Timespace.2548:

I think it’s entirely fine that a good thief can give something to think for all these zombies running in zergs. In that particular video they seem a lot dumber than AI.

You’d also be in favor, then, of reverting the confusion and retaliation change so that I can continue to ‘give thieves something to think’ before they kill themselves by attacking me, right?

I do miss that… but thieves and warriors got their way with that ‘issue.’

DeWolfe.2174:

it’s a good shot of them composition wise.

Are we talking about the one on the left or the one on the right? :o

Read my post somewhere in there… I want some feedback. :P

I think I just wasted 3 minutes scrolling through countless posts about how many bags this or that person was able to get by being a part of a giant zerg either offensively or defensively.

Does anyone in this thread have any measure of individual skill that they can be proud of instead? Makes for more interesting reading material while I slack off on my CompTIA Linux+ certification homework.

I thought you were done. Now I need to test something.

Dear readers,

I concede the final statement/last word to JaeKeun and that all of his statements are infallibly correct based upon the premise that they cannot be logically argued.

Noone likes to debate anymore. That’s probably why we’re all so ignorant. I’ll miss you, 1990’s era forums and IRC chat. :|

…do know that I wasn’t ‘baiting’ you into anything. There’s no data to suggest that any other profession has a higher burst than thief or anything better than equal mobility (warriors and elementalists can be annoying in that department, too).