Guild Wars 2

I dont know much about the SAB, but when it comes to infusions…why dont you just extract it beforehand to be sure?
The extractor is cheap enough and its better to take no risks at all.

Infusions are lost when upgrading ascended items in the Mystic Forge, since the original item is consumed in the crafting process. Make sure to use an Infusion Extraction Device before you do so.
(gw2wiki)

I didnt read every last detail, but it seems like you are really mostly buffing the things, that are weak right now, not trying to overtune already strong meachnics.

The impact strike change seems strange. Its a skill that you are supposed to hit. If you dont, you get punished.

The ‘add physical damage to pisto AA’ got me thinking.
This was discussed a while ago: Im not sure how the thread was named, but it made a good point. The weaponsets do not follow a clear purpose. Both d/d and p/p are trying to be power and condi alike…and fail.
The easiest solution would be to essentially swap death blossom and unload.

Did you suggest to make the second part of pistol whip auto-evade?

Maniacal persistence is pure bs. Pls dont put it on thief.
Its nonsense for a crit build and nobody wants a non-crit build to crit.
The main problem of non-zerker thieves is the ferocity, not the precision.

Bra, you stop quotemining, I start reading what you say, ok?
Edit: ok, I actually read it anyways and youve gotten a bit more reasonable.
But you are still trying to read into my post what isnt there. For example I never said anything against cof mastery farm.
And please stop bringing this back to the front page, im starting to get tired of this.
I made a suggestion, you dont like it, I admit there was something wrong with it, but I still like the idea in general.
So could we just let it rest here?

No class stacking is not balance at all.
You are asking to adress the symptoms (some of the symptoms) but ignoring the disease.
It is very possible to create a meta where every class and multiple builds/class have a place.
Class stacking should be prohibited, but for reasons of interesting team composition and fun matches, not for reasons of balance.

Roleplay: you are a thief

1: Is your team clearly superior? You got the eles? the scrappers? They have a warrior? They have been carried by mmr and are now facing the cold reality of a fitting opponent? You got carried by mmr and still are?
-If yes: proceed to 2
-If no: proceed to 4

2:Is your team able to work with a thief on it? Do they know how to rotate and when not to rotate? Do they know you dont have to go support the thief if the thief flees from far? Do they know you have to hold out if you want a +1?
-If yes: proceed to 3
-If no:proceed to 6

3: You won. Be it you or your team, you did it. No wait. it wasnt your team. Obviously not. Your awesome skills of running around saved the match. You should go to the thief forums and tell everyone their class doesnt suck. Yeah! Thats what you should do.

4:Is your team clearly inferior? You got close and when you prepare to move in for mid they are all dead? A dh sits on far the entire match and they still loose the teamfight?
-If yes: proceed to 5
-If no, proceed to 6

5:You lost. Nothing more you can do about it. They will probably blame you, rightfully or not. ‘If only you had rerolled’ they say. ‘You are there to save our kitten if we mess up a 1v1, where were you? Deffing close? A thief shouldnt do that. I dont care if you were successful. You should have rotated more. Rotated where? We all died before you got there? Yes. Because we had a thief that is!’

6:Are you the best player in the match? Can you skip 2 enemies on one point for minutes? Can you 1v1 the easier classes like necro? Can you deny a cap and still escape alive? Can you down and stomp an opponent before they are done cleaving your teammate? Can you travel from close to far in seconds and undetected?
-If yes: proceed to 7
-If no: proceed to 8

7: Are you making one vital mistake or miscalculation? Are you +1ing the fight that would have been won without you whilst anotherone dies? Are you decapping far when you should have saved close? Have you been wasting you dodges and yre now downed by a 10% health revenant? Have you retreated 2 seconds too late and now lie bleeding out in a critical moment of the game?
-If yes: proceed to 9
-If no: proceed to 3

8:Are you putting your all into it, are tryhard and move at least twice as much as anyone else?
-If yes: proceed to 7
-If no: proceed to 5 (edit)

9:Is anyone in your team getting upset, starting to put all blame on you and trying to tell you what to do, based on what they see on the minimap? ‘Thief dont close’ ‘Why the hell is thief not on close?’ ‘Why is thief deffing close? Go far!’ ‘Why is thief skipping at mid where we all just died, thief should be far’ (note: all of this has actually been said to me in a single match and with a lot more insults)
-If yes: proceed to 3
-If no: proceed to 10

10: Stalemate. Youve screwed up and you cant afford it. But if your team stays focussed and doesnt throw the game because you ‘cant win with a thief’ you might still have a chance.

I had a lot of fun writing this. I hope you realise its satire and not salt. ^^

Well. It was the only one that was remotely close. Finished it in the last 20-30 seconds I believe.
It depends on the party ofc. For example for the legendary imbued shaman. I did all kinds of preparations, bought specialty food to help my party survive…and in the end everybody dodged the attacks perfectly and all elementals were wiped as they spawned.
So I guess there is some luck in it.

Jana.6831:

How did it switch from “Thief will never get a rifle” to “They will never change the core traits” who suggested changing the core traits in this thread? What did I miss?

ETA: I guess “trait” was used as the original meaning and not in game description of a profession’s trait.
Dismiss my question.

No. I was talking about changing quick pockets. But that was only as a side note.

‘Gutting steal’ …in a way I guess. Making it telegraphed, taking away the stolen skills, making it reveal you.
But lets be honest: most of us expected a steal transform when they started to unveil the other elite specs. And this is just one way to transform it.
The 8 initiative on that sort of cooldwon could be viewed as powerful. But you dont have to discuss that with me. There is someone here who did the math for this.
The transformation finally is not power creep at all.
The strong thing about a celestial avatar or a death shroud is the access to a complete new set of skills. Something that is way less beneficcial for an initiative system.
Also the skills themselves. Fakeout bolt, which you seem to be concerned with is a great addition.
It finally makes the shortbow optional. For in-combat movement and heightglitching. It can replace it. But if you want a weapon to quickly escape a fight or a maw trap, it is lethal. It is also way less beneficial for quick rotation.
And if you talk about itscombat effect: if your opponent stays in one spot for 2 seconds, its kinda their own fault to get hit.
The skirmish finally: I wont pretend like its not strong. But we both know daredevil is better if you want dodges. And: its static. Signet of agility, vigor, endurance refilling effects wont do anything.

But again: im just someone who likes the idea. If you want a technical discussion you’ll need to wait for the op to show up. But from my current point of view the op has considered a lot of things you and I didnt even think about and has done a fair share of math to ensure this is not powercreep.

Thats how its called.
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Jade_Kraken_Timed_Mote

Well, its not exactly hard. In all the challenges to unbound I didnt find anything challenging. Kraken might have been the hardest of them all.
However, if you still need players I can help you out.

Shadow.1345:

I read that stuff however I sincerely doubt they will change core traits so they can change the steal mechanic into some kind of celestial avatar form for thieves’’…’’Changing steal into some sort of initiative regen thing that still does all the steal trait stuff and gives access to “avatar” form is a radical change to the mechanic. You might be better off adding a new mechanic because your current idea is pretty much gutting steal entirely and replacing it with an obscene amount of power creep.

Are you sure you read it?

Pve or pvp?
I use vault in pvp a lot, but not exclusively. For example weakening strikes is much stronger if your enemies are good enough to dodge the highly-telegraphed vault.
Or as a combo with steal.
In pve vault is a dps loss I think, at least if you have quickness. Weakening strikes is better than AA, but only if you manage to reliably hit all 3 strikes.

-To be honest I didnt even consider ink purge. S/d does not have much reveal access, CnD is a little expensive for one cleanse and relying on steal…I dont know. But i’d have to try it out.

-I wouldnt worry about it being too powerful. I mostly wanted to justify why one would play s/d DE oder DrD. Its definetely a tough decision due to the lack of UC and EA.

-Youre right, it could be even more devastating on rifle.. Smoke tracer+ quick pockets would essentially gain you more initiative then you loose. But I dont think putting a icd on the trait would be too much of a problem.
Tho if I could choose: I would replace the trait with one that removes cooldown on weapon swap entirely. It fits the thief better and would finally make for a valuable choice.

That bug was really annoying. Good thing they finally fixed it. Thankfully it was rather rare…
But im not sure: is the bug only fixed on berserker or on core warrior too? Nah, my bad, it didnt occur on core.

Calm down people. I strongly doubt it was ‘silenced’. Id rather believe someone removed it by accident before I participate in this Anet-conspiracy theories.

Daredevil is a straight upgrade to thief.
Unless you are commited to play stealth you should take DrD over shadow arts.
Its faster, more sustainable and deals more damage.

Appearently. Its gone from the dev tracker too.
huh…

kitten you are right. I should have let excel do the summation.

Maybe. Ive noticed that it is hard to create an individual profile with with only the few points. But on the other hand putting limits to oneself is one of the best ways to come up with good ideas. I could experimentally distribute another 60 points and see where that would get me.
But of course this is mostly an illustration, not what I will actually base my work on.

OK. Thank you so far for your feedback.
If gotten a couple of positive responses and nobody shouted at me, so I guess my basic concepts are at least ‘ok’
Youve also made me think about parts of this concept, and I have a much clearer idea of what im heading towards. Thanks for that.
I will start working on this now and stop checking the forum every 15 minutes. ^^

If you have any ideas for balance but dont have as much fun working out the details, let me know. The result is meant as an inspiration for the devs, but im very open to be inspired myself.

Hmmm. That is a little odd definition of support. So damage is support too because you can force enemies to disengage and not deal damage?
When i talk about support I mean: Boons, healing, aoe cleanse, ressing.
And all of this but cleansing does not really have a place at the necro.

We know they are druids because nobody plays base specs.
Elites are superior so everybody uses elites. Those who dont are not much of a threat.

The best thing a thief can do with lord is skip at lord.
Of course you can pull of a lordrush, but its dangerous and I rather have my team do the rush while I carry for the decaps.
If you do it, use blinding power and AA. Make sure you pull all the mobs in one place so they stay blinded and watch out for the lords heal to interrupt it.

Could you people pls read the text and not just look at the pretty picture? ^^
I know druid doesnt deal less damage (though effectively they do due to mender)
But it should. Not much, but if you decide to play a support role, you dont deal as much damage.

I dont know what BnS is. Google tells me it might be blade and soul (which I at least heard of)
Im not working with stats, im working with abilities and traits. Stats should be left to the gear.

Right now im aiming on three playable builds for each class without elite specialisations.
Elite specialisations could either expand on one of those options or open up completely new ones. (depending on the direction given by anet)
For warriors I have three basic concepts, as you hinted, they are heavily dependant on weaponsets.
-Frontline tank. Hard to kill, slow, decent melee damage. Probaly going with weapons like shield or hammer (this is what I wanted my warrior to be when I started this game)
-Blademaster. Still somewhat tanky, but faster and with a more offensive background. Greatsword, axes, swords.
-Combat archer. Basically an evolution of hambow or shoutbow builds. Meaning: a bow, but still better suited for close range and able to eat up some bursts.

The second and third one could be turned into mostly offensive builds by selecting the berserker elite spec.

You have to realize im not aiming on a minor rework or the change of some numbers.
Right now im expecting to rework most traits and a lot of skills, change the elitespec system and add another traitline to each specialisation. Im thinking about calling it an ‘utopian balance framework’.

How about being able to Q for every ‘unlocked’ division of choice?
Not progressing ofc.
This could also be helpful for people who want to test builds and dont like unranked.
Lets be honest: whoever just wants to farm noobs in th lower divisions already does so via alt accounts.
If the matchmaking in general gets fixed, this should not cause much of a problem…
Actually this could help all the ‘above average’ people who are mysteriously caught in mmrhell. In lower divisions they could obviously carry their teams against worse opponents and slowly fix their win/loose ratio.

And a low number in mobilty doesnt mean you cant move. It just means its gotta cost you something to do so.
You should always be able to make tradeoffs. I just want to create a natural affliction towards certain roles.
Maybe i’ll have to make this a little more spikier tho. For some classes at least.
Would you basically agree with:
Warrior, thief, necro strong in in 2/6
Revenant, Ranger, Guard, mesmer strong in 3-4/6
Ele, Engi strong in 5-6/6
?
Strong is relative ofc. I would keep the 120point distribution.

MadVisions.4529:

Asrat.2645:

We cant make every class do everything. Maintaining an identity is more important to me.

the diagrams show the exact opposite. classes do not have direct peacks to an atribute except for warrior or thief

I see what you mean. I wouldnt be too concerned about this tho. Yes, I want to maintain the ability for different playstyles without forcing people too much into one direction.
But this is only one half of what I call the ‘identity’
It would also involve f.E. mesmers relying much more on illusive and deceptive gameplay and revenants being muhc more bound to their current invocation.
If I give a class a small peak in damage and condition damage, I mean that both is possible, aswell as a hybrid.
But I dont mean you get both by default.

Asrat.2645:

Nono. Im working on the way it should be, not the way it is.
And elite specialisations are going to work a little different…

^^

Nono. Im working on the way it should be, not the way it is.
And elite specialisations are going to work a little different…

Ok. Thanks for the feedback.
Druid mobility could be a problem, since the ranger doesnt have much of a skill I could take away.

Revenants will not be a problem. I have a good idea for them.

Warrior mobility, maybe. But it should not be their strongest area. In combat mobility perhaps but not rotation mobility.
Thats one of the big problems of the current ele, they can still go whereever they are needed. If someone can sit on a point without dying it should at least be easy to outrotate them.

Ok, Like many out there im an amateur developer and think I alone know whats best for this game.(at least for sPvP) ^^
So im working on a rather extensive balance overhaul, mostly for fun and as a source of inspiration for the devs.
Part of this balance overhaul is to match the roles classes take in combat to the class concepts.
Part of what I consider class concept is a general tendency of strenghts and weaknesses.
So building for example a warrior as a tank should feel most natural, due to traits and skills supporting that decision.
Building a damage-dealer warrior can still be possible, but only as a niche build with specific weapon sets and a rather small choice in fitting utility.

If you dont like that idea in general and think that is too much of a trinity, dont bother to answer. It doesnt matter if you are right or I am, but that is what I believe to be healthy game design. We cant make every class do everything. Maintaining an identity is more important to me.

So what is this thread for? Below you find a first concept of ‘stat distribution’
The way I believe it should be.
What I want to know is if you strongly disagree on any of those.
Right now all classes use an equal number of ‘points’: 120, so theoretically this is ‘fair’
Please keep in mind that this is only a part of what im going for. I just want to know if the players are happy with the ‘role’ I assigned to their favourite class.

I dont play wvw. I use paladin staff for sPvP, so: no stealth at all.
I defend that build because it can be countered.
Mesmer huh? Yeah I can imagine that is annoying. Low health pool, a lot of skills requiring target.
And I remember fighting mesmers with d/d acro, that was pretty mean too. They had no chance.
But what if you just blink out?
They have relativley few movement skills for a thief. Until theyve caught up to you, they are hopefully out of stealth. And their traps lay wasted on the ground.

I dont say I approve of that thieves, but there is counterplay. As long as you can do something against it, its fair.
There are condition removals, resistance, movement skills (yes, you can just walk away)
and of course reveal skills.
Last but not least uncatchable tells you their position, so you can just spam aoe cc on them.
Usually if you die it should be due to suprise. Like the OP’s video. You dont expect to be attacked and cant react fast enough.
And that is kinda your own fault and also the intention of a trapper build.

Ever backstabbed a critter? ^^

Hmmm.
1)Thieves are fairly weak – true
2)There are a lot of bad thief players – true
3)Most players (thief or not) dont admit they are bad – true

But I dont think that justifies telling thieves to change. People like to pretent so, but a s thief or warrior doesnt loose you the game if the rest of the team is ok.
I dont play my thief in ranked, but that is my choice. Not anyone else’s. You can try to ask people to change, but its their game and their choice what they want to play.

If a player is just bad, it has nothing to do with them being thieves.
A bad necro might be better than a bad thief, but that difference wont decide the game.

If they insist on being good and clearly they are not…too bad.
But dont just blame the thief. The fact of the matter is, that your team has to play with the thief in order for the thief to work.
If you dont rotate the right way the thief cant either and is forced into suboptimal scenarios.
-If the thief dies first, its the thief’s fault
-If the thief dies last, its the team fault

Oh as you may have observed im a big supporter of giving us back the duelist role.
I just think we should have to sacrifice mobility to do so.
For example working more with weapons that are not shortbows.

No. Its true unfortunately. As long as we are as mobile, we cant be too strong in 1v1.
You really dont want a class that can move to any point they want and force you to rotate there with two players to get it back.
Mobility and dueling strenght should be exclusive.
Traits, skills, weapon sets, whatever: You can only have one of it, not both..

And: ‘mobility is not a combat skill.’
That is not true. Mobility is the strongest combat skill.
It doesnt matter what games you play, but movement, positioning, rotation, whatever you want to call it, its a pro players asset and will win the war.
It will not win the fight unfortunately, and thats why a lot of us are so frustrated.

I just came across your ‘elite spec collection’ and remebered I owe you some builds.
Nice idea btw, I have some unfinished concepts flying around, maybe I’ll try to make something of it.
Anyways: I have four. Three of them are pretty obvious and basically what I had in mind when I first thought about this. I dont think any of them will suprise you.
The fourth one is a little more special. I like it.
I havent worked out every detail everywhere. There are some flaws, some non-maximized efficency and a lot of things where I just stayed close to typical choices without thinking about uncommon alternatives. But there we go.
All four are designed for sPvP

kitten , I had no idea sylvari had such an awesome coat. Definetly the third one.
I generally dont like electric dyes, but you found a good way to make them work.
Finally, lets be honest: Unbound doesnt fit in there. Not thematically, not in the colour scheme.
I perfectly understand it, I use it too even tho it doesnt fit. Its a must have if you like FotM. I hope the awesomness of ad infinitum will be able to cover the fact that it, like a lot of wings, doesnt work with most character designs.

Its not like you had a choice.
You can take a break.
You can play unranked/hotjoin
Or you have to put up with loosing streaks.
Once you are in mmrhell all you can do is maneuvering yourself deeper into it.

I dont say that is good. I dont say they should have not deployed several experimental fixes by now.
But they didnt and they wont.
Right now all we can do is try to help them find a solution for the problems the game has. But we can not change anything on our own. We have to put up with whatever the game is.

The only thing you can try is to change the rules, aka
-Join or organize tournaments for like-minded players
-Play only with a full premade
-start an alt account with unspoiled mm

Again: Its not great the way it is, but as long as we cant change it we have to work with what weve got.

How is it disrespectful?
They screwed up the matchmaking, their update policy doesnt allow them to change it mid-season.
So, once your mm is spoiled, you wont be able to just fix it. Neither will they.
Now, why exactly wouldnt you play unranked? The mm is better, as a good player you are likely to have a good time, you dont have to care about wins or losses, you escape that toxic maximization-enviroment…

Look: All im saying is this: ranked sucks. Not for everybody, but according to this forum for a lot of people.
So why exactly do you keep playing it?
There is no reason unless you are just after the backpack.
Unranked is more fun. For people who cant really play due to the teams they get in mmrhell it might even be more competitive.

Personally I was riding winning streaks to mid ruby, when I first realised how flawed the matchmaking was.
Spawncamping is no fun, even if you are on the winning side of it.
So when I understood that little badge next to my name was completely meaningless, I went unranked and started playing thief again.
Its much better this way.
They will fix the problems we have eventually, but until then there is no reason to spoil the game for yourself by being stubborn.

SlateSloan.3654:

I still think the majority of players went from gw1 to gw2. gw1 community had a name back in the days for being a very mature audience though we where young. The game itself had a name for offering most beautiful graphics for an onlinegame, also the topic was pretty mature and true to itself. You had no pink glittering asuras jumping around or weapons which look like some candy handhelds from funfairs. or some tiny npc girls inside a half baked story jiggling around finding their kitten girly loveboat… Its just extreme unbelieveable what junk they made out of the lore. I think its ok that companies dont care for gender, sexual habits, etc when hiring staff but heres a kitten majority of players to serve. Its just unbelieveable how much transgender and homosexual influence is put into an electronic entertainment product aimed at families and casual players. When arenanet had gw2 in developement they already knew what they would be about to make out of the once mature medieval world. Before gw1 went into its endstage they already tested the gemstore model and started offering stuff via store. In the future we will see more expansions i think, but i will rather try to get them for some 20 bucks via china website than to pay full price. Most players have come a little in the years now. We dont have that much time anymore like we had 10 years ago. We have now daily real life stuff to do and to take care of.

Only thing which would be interesting for me is how many total accounts there are and how many of them have a gw1 account attached.

No one at arenanet cares if anyone leaves. Most gemstore items are of the same 3d model and just carry different textures or colors. I bet the profit margin on a single item is extremely high, just have a look at the annual report.

What?

I mean: if you complained about homosexuality not fitting lore-wise due to being harrassed in a true dark-ages setting, I would agree,

But you actually just said it wouldnt fit for a game aimed at ‘families’. srsly…what?

In general I love the way gw2 is going against racial and sexual stereotypes. Ofc an asura vigil warrior looks a little ridiculous, but it is so much better than having only the ‘strong and manly’ becoming frontliners and making the ‘feminin and weak’ healers, rangers or thieves. And the best thing about it: they dont make a big deal of it. Its just the way it is.

I partially agree about all the glitter and ‘happy go lucky’ stuff, I prefer my game worlds to be a little more sinister (wh) but based on the design of characters I see running around most people seem to like it.
They should remove stuff like Quip tho, but thats another topic.

Finally the lore itself is pretty cool, especially the parts that dont include destinies edge. LS2 and onward was extremely awesome work and I love the character design.

Last but not least @op: Nobody cares. At all. The few people that quit out of protest and not for a good reason dont matter for sales. They come to the forums and make a big deal out of it and act it out in order to get attention for their first world problems.
You also have to realize that most of them only quit ‘temporarely’. I can kinda understand that. If you are unhappy with a game and the content you play is not enjoyable to you, you quit and return after it has changed.
Those who quit for good in order to ‘punish anet’ shalt not be taken serious.

You should try reading other threads on this forum.
7/10 are complaining about this. The so-called MMR-HELL.
There are a lot of ‘solution attempts’ but I dont think they work much.
Just dont play ranked. It is not in any way an indicator of skill what flashy symbol you have next to your name. Not in this season at least.
You get a lot of nice games in unranked, and dont have bother whether you loose or not. You can even play the classes and builds you like.

I main a thief. DHs suck.
I dont mean as in ‘completely unviable’ or ‘wont ever do it’ or ‘bringing their team down’
But I would prefer every single class but warrior on my team over dh. Even thieves if I know theyre good. (took me some time to admit that tho)

I can stand in a dh’s traps. They can push and pull me over test of faith (If I have no stability that is)
They can interrupt my heal skills. They can use the damage skills as they want…
They wont kill me. And im not talking about ele, not about scrapper, im talking about druid.
Theyve got some heals, but my bristleback could kill a dragon hunter without me even attacking (might be overexagurating here, havent tried it ^^)

There are two levels of dh. The noob hunters, who hunt noobs, give them a good player and they fail.
And the guard players, people who knew the class before it got that op flavour for one season.
But both types are extremely easy to counter (stability, protection and reflection), have little sustain in teamfights, and rely on high-cd utilities for a good portion of their damage.
Big parts of the damage a dh does is shifted from weapon skills to utility skills. That means in order to deal high damage they have to sacrifice their stunbreaks, boons, jail escapes, heals, aoe cleanses…

That may be, but that is another forum. Its not just a subforum or a ./de.
I admittedly was suprised the bbcode or textile img upload didnt work, but thats just the way it is.
Dont know if there is an official explanation for this, but they probably have a reason.
Its also not completely uncommon. Many forums dont allow image uploads.

Upload as attachements.

Dont feed it.
fifteen

That does not seem like a good idea.
There are better ways to increase build diversity. Forcing players to not take smthg is about as helpful as forcing them to take smthg.

It would be an interesting idea to have a Q option to not Q with people using elite specs.
There are so many poeple crying about how elite specs are so op (true) and how they are ruining everything (false). This could make the game a lot more enjoyable for those poeple and everyone who doesnt own HoT.

And its not spvp ^^.
Anyways: you can go with marauder or paladin. Or even zerker if you only aim for having fun in unranked.
I even tried mender+assassins reward. Its not as bad as it sounds, but I dont think I can recommend it.And of course the valkyrie jumper. Just to give you an idea of what is possible.

Traitlines? Well. Daredevil. Trickery is also a good idea, but acrobatics can work too.
Shadow arts>critical strikes but not much. CS is possible.

Escapists absolution>staff master>impacting disruption. You shouldnt force interrupt skills in a build that has none. So the trait wont work.
UC>BD. You can still decide to change that, but it seems to work better that way.
With the lack of smoke fields, one of the biggest advantages of BD is gone
On the other traitlines just go with the most logical choices. If you have some basic knowledge in building thieves, you cant do much wrong there.

Im a big fan of vampire runes. Ive also seen scrapper or wurm or even thief. Probably depends on whether you want to focus on offensive or defensive.

Sigil of air/blood/fire. No big suprises here.

Channeled vigor or withdraw. I prefer CV but cant say that withdraw is worse.
Bandits defense, shadowstep or both
1st choice: fist flurry, signet of agility
2nd choice: impairing daggers, haste
Impact strike>basilisk venom, unless you want to rely on fist flurry etc for a burst.

General advice:
-Use all staff skills. They are all strong and situational. Vault will be important, but there are others.
-You can basically evade everything with signet of agility, make use of it. Also time your vault in an enemies attack. You evade, they have a harder time denying.
-You have a fast and strong gap closer. Dont be afraid to open a gap. If you use a vault from distance, make sure you dont look their way when you do it and pretent like you are just running around.
-Without stealth or black powder, cleaving is usually faster than stomping.
-Vault is a leap. Use it. Especially in rangers stolen skills.