The entire original post does not invite real discussion IMO, but we can still try.
You mention mesmer now being able to do more damage from stealth then thief can. How can this be intended when thief is meant to be the assassination class?
I play mesmer, as well as thief and warrior. I am way more skilled at the other two, yet the rewards I claim as a mesmer are far greater then with either war or thief. This is coming from a wvw roaming perspective.
Currently, the skill floor is too low. The ceiling is still high, though.
A big flaw you have is right now Thief is kinda useless in any roaming situation or competitive besides +1 or decapping, unless you are running the Ghost Thief build, and if you are losing using that build you have other issues, Thieves have been nerfed to near oblivion except for niche mobility, so comparing that class to mesmer right now is useless, when they have nothing else going for them.
I do not agree about thief being useless. Bottom line is last WTS, every team ran thief and one thief won the MVP award. Majority of ESL teams still run thieves. It might be true that in the coming expansion due to the abundance of reveal and other forms of support from chrono and scrapper, thief maybe phased out but we have to wait to see.
You are also taking the ‘besides +1 or decapping’ too lightly. This is actually a big part of sPvP. sPvP is all about rotation and create favorable matchups for your team. Thief also boost up the other bursty spec greatly in a coordinated team. As a mesmer, a good thief teammate will make your burst way more scary. The only other profession that might have similar potential is engi.
At the end of the day, thief is still the best ganker in the game, most capable of dealing kill blow. Provide the best stealth shelter for teammates. Have very good survivability and good synergy with many other professions.
If a point has a defender if it’s not another thief it will most likely end with the thief having to run away or die trying to Decap the point. The argument that thief has been meta since launch is only because of their mobility not their burst, +1ing is ok but any class can do that. Thieves are not the best Gankers, that’s a far cry from the truth.
All I’m saying is the crap is annoying. You use the blurred Frenzy shatter stealth burst set up. Repeat. the shatters have blinds i mean your already perma evading. then your hiding. I dont think you guys have fought a good mesmer that knows what im talking about. Now I dont even care about warriors endure pain thats not even OP at all. actually tbh Its perfectly fine.
You guys are failing to read. Which is causing this to be blown away. Mesmers atm are the strongest class. They are tanky. can full heal. and can reset faster then thiefs can. they also have the evade the pu stealth or Mantra bursts which give them stat bonuses allowing them to be in berserker. I’ve also played PU shatter and i know once you get the rotation down its easy to play.
Now Burns. Its a big issue currently in the picture i posted I managed to do 7.2k burns. in spvp. Yes i was built for it. but The thing is even though your built for it You have so much more utiltiy. Im talking about engineer and Ele burns. Ele burn are slightly worst then Engineers but engineers stack faster. Condi cleanse is sort of an issue.
Cele Ammy. It still needs a nerf. Any good engineer or d/d ele will agree with me. I dont have many valid points to prove it should but its quite annoying burning down a good cele ele or engineer when they can heal up in a second from near death
Also Blood sigil is broken still no life steal.
Sounds like you have fallen prey to stand in a BF instead getting out of range of it, since Mesmer shatter burst is easy to spot since they have to set it up, and again a 2.5 sec evade that is rooted is not OP, when it was a 2.5 sec invulnerability it was a little OP but still easily dealt with.
Burn is a little over the top right now yes but still easily dealt with it just means having the proper tools to deal with it, ie condi cleanse which every class has access to, hell you can even pick up sigil of Generosity and have more condi cleanse, yeah burn allows for burst condi builds which fall flat on their face if you survive the initial burst by dodge and condi cleanse…. since you know Burn Guards are squishy.
i wouldn’t say warriors don’t sacrifice anything. if it’s not for their gm trait then they have to sacrifice a utility slow while mesmer doesn’t; for the price of dps.
another comparable skill to bf is pw, but nobody uses sword pistol on thief anymore, even if the skill itself is potent. this just kinda shows that even if certain skills are strong they won’t make a certain weapon/skill more desired.
Another downside to obsidian flesh is it has a cast time while Endure Pain does not.
no it’s instant.
Ah for some reason I though Obsidian flesh had. Cast time, I haven’t touched ele in 3 years. Thanks for the info
Pretty sure Defy pain is a Master trait nor a GM trait, and that argument is similar to people complaining about Condi damage and they don’t slot Condi removal. So you are telling me that a warrior can get the effects of Endure Pain twice when one Bypasses the utility CD, and I’m pretty sure Warriors don’t take Defense Traitlines for just that one Master trait.
Another downside to obsidian flesh is it has a cast time while Endure Pain does not.
If you have condi on you when you BF they still tick. BF just stop from more applying for 2.5s. Again with Distortion Mesmers have to sacrifice Dps and Cc to make themselves Invulnerable, while Endure Pain doesn’t have that trade off besides a longer CD. While Obsidian flesh is good since it’s lower CD and has full Invulnerable I could have compared that one to BF as well.
(edited by BlaqueFyre.5678)
Ok, makes sense so I should just save up for Scholars.
I wonder how OP deals with Warriors Endure Pain for 4 secs if he can’t handle a 2.5 sec rooted evade. Which was nerfed from being Invulnerable along time ago.
There’s certainly not a longer cooldown on Endure Pain, and BF isnt usually coupled with a root from leap either. Right?
I don’t really care about this topic at this point, people will adapt and power creep will grow because people love buffs and hate nerfs, but let’s be real here. 12 sec cd vs 60. And there’s always Distort. People happily forget things when they want to make incorrect comparisons.
Anyways, good luck everyone, this just struck me as silly.
Given the fact that you are rooted to on spot, do low dps with it, are pretty big draw backs, it shines when you have people that are smart enough to stand in front and eat all 8 swings of it.
Let’s see an invulnerability that allows you full mobility able to use attacks and so on while still not dating any direct/physical damage is more powerful so yes it should have a longer CD and it lasts almost twice as long.
So your argument is pretty invalid.
As for distortion it uses up resources that could be otherwise used to dps, since most builds rely on shattering clones for spike damage using Mind Wrack which means the Mesmer is giving up that damage to stop themselves from taking damage for 4 secs, still a decent tradeoff.
I wonder how OP deals with Warriors Endure Pain for 4 secs if he can’t handle a 2.5 sec rooted evade. Which was nerfed from being Invulnerable along time ago.
Decided to pop into the Spvp forums and was greeted with this as the top post. Have fun….
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/pvp/Mesmers-Burns-and-Celestial
Yeah, for scholar I will have to grind… I mean save up the gold for. While I have a bank full of Opals.
And are Eagle runes that good comparitivley?
So it looks like I will be using Opal orbs till something better comes along
The entire original post does not invite real discussion IMO, but we can still try.
You mention mesmer now being able to do more damage from stealth then thief can. How can this be intended when thief is meant to be the assassination class?
I play mesmer, as well as thief and warrior. I am way more skilled at the other two, yet the rewards I claim as a mesmer are far greater then with either war or thief. This is coming from a wvw roaming perspective.
Currently, the skill floor is too low. The ceiling is still high, though.
A big flaw you have is right now Thief is kinda useless in any roaming situation or competitive besides +1 or decapping, unless you are running the Ghost Thief build, and if you are losing using that build you have other issues, Thieves have been nerfed to near oblivion except for niche mobility, so comparing that class to mesmer right now is useless, when they have nothing else going for them.
Hmm I could have sworn it was all summoned minions which include Phantasms and clones
Don’t have the gear or infusions yet, I am lining everything out so I can craft it all in one go. So any suggestions are appreciated.
All I can say is Well put and #STICKY!!!!!!
Ok, that build I linked has 70% with food and utility buffs
Any suggestions for this? Just a quick throw together to try and maximize Crit while not sacrificing too much power.
This is good info, thanks everyone.
Thank you everyone for the Feedback, I guess I will find a balance between both and my in game wallet. To find what best suits me.
So I decided to make a second Mesmer afree not playing one in 1+ years, I remember seeing an old post comparing Zerker to Assassin’s on Mesmer, where they were withing marginal ranges of each other but Assassin’s winning out in most situations. My question is is this still true today?
kitten , I was wondering why it didn’t seem to last longer
I use Mental Anguish as well
So quick question I run a Shatter build in Spvp, would it be a good idea to use Sigil of Impact and Paralyzation with Harmonious Mantras, CS and MoD?
@ Vesper
The best fix is to redesign stealth and the Thief class, what you are proposing won’t fix the issue in the least, it will provide a bandaid. Most thieves don’t even like the state of stealth but since 80% of their survivability is in stealth they defend it against cries for nerfs to thieve skills and traits, if you want a fix Anet needs to get rid of their crap stealth mechanic put in a better stealth mechanic and re design/ balance out thief Survivability.
Obviously I want a redesign too but this is GW2. There will be no redesign so there’s no point in even bothering to discuss it. We have to deal with the way things are, not what they should be.
Sadly I find myself agreeing with you on this, no matter how many times the whole community has asked for a redesign they will never do it. And it’s putting off alot of players.
It’d not that SB skills are not good it’s that they are overshadowed by SB 5 and most times using a Melee weapon is better in most situations, in Wvw I use SB to allow me and my 2 Mesmer buddies catch anyone while we Roam, cause being immob’d and having six shatters hit at once just nukes people.
Yea Im just waiting for S/D to get even a sliver of its former glory, I never stopped using it and DD is a slap to the face but it’s something for now to help with my desires
And then the traps getting damage removed was a bandaid for thieves not using the runes or traps, it’s a vicious cycle of lazy balancing.
Pope you stated more elegantly what I stated at the same time…….. :/
Normally not so many D/D thieves, the reason why Thieves don’t talk about SB 1-4 is they are underwhelming compared to SB 5 since Thieves use an Initiative system instead of a CD system for weapon skills allows more for having two weapon sets for damage, we mainly use the SB 5 for mobility, like I said earlier Thieves best defense and offense is their mobility not passive defenses or huge numbers from burst damage, being able to quickly engage/disengage is what makes thieves good in the current iteration of nerfs the Thief received. Having 2 melee weapon sets will limit your offensive and defensive capabilities, there was a time a few years back where it was viable and somewhat rewarding to use two melee sets, the SB was still king, but since all your skills are tied to the same resource pool having two melee sets limits what you can and cannot do, if you empty your ini pool swapping weapons won’t change anything like it does on other classes. It leaves you with a CD on weapon swap and no attacks other than AA till you build Ini.
@Hannibal.
Yes SB 5 and Shadowstep are both “Teleports” but Shadowstep has a long CD while SB 5 does not it relies on initiative to use, the Thiefs biggest and best defense and arguably their offense is their potential for mobility, no other class can match Thief Mobility, it is very rare if you ever use SB for dps, maybe for quick Aoe bursts when +1ing and for combo fields but you initiative is better used else where in those situations due to all of Thieves defense reliable on their weapons sets and requiring active play vs passive bonus. If a class cannot pin you down they can’t kill you that easily.
Ok, will keep that in mind, it was just a thought.
Ok I usually use Withdraw, was thinking of using HiS to see if I like it, after work I will post my build.
Ok, normally my havoc group is me and 2 Mesmers one is Power and the other condi PU, sometimes I roam on my own taking camps, but just for info what’s better for a normal S/D across build? Valks or Knights ?
I don’t run stealth thief builds, I have fought against them and if you know in your server meta people are running Ghost Thieves you need to do better sweeps…. I have only ever ran S/D and S/P since Launch after the initial getting to know the Thief class. But again Thieves are the problem, it’s Anet’s lazy way of handling stealth that’s the problem, even Thieves hate their reliance on stealth, if they put a better stealth system that wasn’t easily spammable and provided a redesigned /rebalance Thief class then it would fix the majority of the problems.
@ Vesper
The best fix is to redesign stealth and the Thief class, what you are proposing won’t fix the issue in the least, it will provide a bandaid. Most thieves don’t even like the state of stealth but since 80% of their survivability is in stealth they defend it against cries for nerfs to thieve skills and traits, if you want a fix Anet needs to get rid of their crap stealth mechanic put in a better stealth mechanic and re design/ balance out thief Survivability.
@a pharmacy
Saying they won’t have a sign that they are there is a lie, Black Powder leaves red rings, and same with Sr which has a huge house over it, thieves relying on setting traps to maintain perma stealth is next to impossible due to the small uptime of the stealth provided vs the CD of traps, they rely on D/P for the permastealth, which again has a tell with the red aoe from the BP. the Trapper Rune Provides 3 secs of stealth per trap placed with a max of three traps and MwS that’s 12 secs total that gives no indication, while the need to use the BP to keep it going till traps are off CD… so there are indications that a thief is there, a thief can do all of these things without the Trapper Runes, the runes just make it easier. not trying to directly defending just stating flaws in your argument, I’m supporting a redesign for this crap not a bandaid nerf.
So instead of crying nerf, cry for stealth and thief redesign, and make everyone happy, because I know thieves are tired of being in a crap position build wise, and most players hate the stealth mechanic that Anet implemented, they can redesign it to make a better experience for everyone and stop all the crying from both sides.
The thief needs to stack the stealth the stealth provided doesn’t last more than a few seconds each time, outside of getting enough stacks or SR
So while on this subject, I an getting back into WvW on my S/D Teef mostly doing Havoc and running with zergs every so often, I have berserker ascend for chest legs and feet should I keep those and do Valk or Knights for the rest?
Being “lazy” by actively countering an ability with positioning and gameplay hmm, funny.
No the thief is being lazy for placing his black powder in a position where his opponent can easily reach it and counter it.
Ok makes more sense now, how you worded the original sounded weird as if you were talking about the non thief stepping into the BP circle.
If I can defeat Ghost Thieves on a Medi Guardian which is the worst mobility wise then yeah its easily counterable, but instead of calling for nerf why don’t you call for them to fix the real problem, which is Stealth and a redesign of thieves, since your issue is with stealth, and how thieves interact with it, but no you want to exasperated the issue by calling for band aid nerfs which have failed everythime in regards to Anet “balancing” if they stopped relying so much on forum talk and had a competent balance team to sit down and analyze the actual root issues which is Stealth itself and the design of the Thief they would be able to make a more useable balanced class that people would stop QQ’ing about, but hey even when thieves didnt rely on stealth people QQ’ed maybe they think Thieves should be free kills, but hey what do I know.
Grand Prat what you suggest are just Nerfs, nerfs are what put Thieves in this state, I hope Anet realizes the State of thieves because of these Gimmicky builds, which have lots of built in counter to them if players weren’t lazy,or used them, all classes have varying access to forced reveal, all classes can stand in the black powder aoe, all classes have access to condi cleanse, if the players use the mechanics Anet gave them instead of choosing the “better” option for utility, if you are dying to this build apparently it’s not the better option, yes I find this build pointless but Anet knew exactly how this spec would interact in game since you know it’s the reason they took direct damage from traps.
think saying one should stand in blackpowder is quite easy to say but harder to do..
first of all u dont know where thief is thus u might be looking wrong way and react to late not all classes have ports etc.
second of all thief is quite mobile (which is good) so he could gain distance far quicker then you can prolly so like i said getting into blackpowder sounds easy but its alot harder when u dont know where to look.. yes on the ground lil red circle i know i know but when im in hide you have no clue where im running too u dont know where to look u have to scan a whole lot of land to find my lil circle..as for the guy who answered me i didnt say how to kill these thiefs, i just said people who run this build are in my eyes just terrible players who are not looking for a good fight but want to win at all cost, which means im pointing at the THIEF :P not the players who die from the thief..
I WvW on 3 classes my Guard, Mes and thief even on my Medi Guard I have no issues with countering the Ghost Thief by standing in his BS aoe, and Guardian is the most Mobility deficient classes Gw2 has to offer, yes it can get annoying and takes attention to detail to fight Ghost Thieves but it’s possible, yeah thief mobility is good. But it’s not all that hard and most classes have ways to aoe cc/knock back/ fear which also work well to get the Thief out of the BS aoe which can cause h to reveal if he was running low on stealth.
Hey like I said I think the build is stupid but I hope it brings attention to the Thief so Anet is not lazy when it actually comes to a fix for them. But there are quite a few counters to it which require active gameplay yes instead of passive abilities. But the only people you have to blame for this build is Anet they knew how thieves would interact in their game by removing direct damage from thief traps, they wanted thieves to use traps since they were useless before so they removed the damage aspect of them.
Being “lazy” by actively countering an ability with positioning and gameplay hmm, funny.
Puck they may not have access to a reveal skill but they do to Stealth Disruptor, which was put in so all classes have access to reveal, there’s also pressuring the Black Powder field, there are ways to counter this hell even if your run condi cleanse the thief will have alot harder time to kill you, but people don’t want to do this, they say it’s an inconvenience and that there are better options for utilities or traits and items to use, well if you are dying to trapper thief that easy those aren’t better options for you.
yes it’s a gimmicky build yes it has counters to it, yes Anet knew what they were doing before making the changes to thief traps, actually use the advice to counter it and it won’t be an issue, but I hope it brings attention to The state of the thief and get Anet to redesign the class so it gets fixed so gimmicky builds like this don’t pop up.
Grand Prat what you suggest are just Nerfs, nerfs are what put Thieves in this state, I hope Anet realizes the State of thieves because of these Gimmicky builds, which have lots of built in counter to them if players weren’t lazy,or used them, all classes have varying access to forced reveal, all classes can stand in the black powder aoe, all classes have access to condi cleanse, if the players use the mechanics Anet gave them instead of choosing the “better” option for utility, if you are dying to this build apparently it’s not the better option, yes I find this build pointless but Anet knew exactly how this spec would interact in game since you know it’s the reason they took direct damage from traps.
Or sigil of Generosity, which gives the condi back to them
Phantasms don’t break stealth except when you shatter them iirc.
Runiir, you are missing the point, Anet did this too themselves, they saw Noone especially thieves were not using traps, so they added Trapper Runes, still thieves did not use traps, so they removed the direct damage application of them, well aware of the Synergies they had implemented previously.
People complain about stealth instead of fixing the issue they give thieves reveal on hits, and give other classes to reveal thieves, people don’t use the reveal utilities, skills and items given to them because there are better ootions to use, they still complain.
Hell even now if you take out the Trapper Runes all together Thieves can use this build without any issues. Yes this is an abusive build yes it’s a stupid build, but it’s effective and has been around for quite a while.
Now they can fix this and have had 3 years to do so, either redesign stealth completely and not just band aids like revealed, Redesign the Thief Completely and spread out the Survivability into more traitlines, make more builds viable, but even then people have complained when thieves didnt use stealth outside of SR which resulted in unnecessary Nerfs.
I agree, stealth needs re-designed, and yes thieves need something other than stealth as a defensive.
Thieves, I feel, they assumed would function as the stealth in combat, get in position, burst out then do what they can to finish them off style. However, it hasn’t really worked that way for them and they need to redesign the thief to simply fight “dirty”. More interrupt/disable based with stealth as a side thing rather than the only thing. Besides…their schtick isn’t stealth anyway…it is supposed to be initiative and stealing…so making them so reliant on stealth seems even farther counter productive to me.
Daredevil adds some options, the extra dodge is nice, and the effects while dodging are interesting. I didn’t get much time with DD, but I did find myself enjoying thief for the first time for once. I didn’t feel like stealth was as needed.
The big gripe I have with DD is that it’s nothing really new it’s a rebranded Acrobatics line which is a slap in the face to Thieves, which used to have extra dodges before Jun 23rd, and they got nerfed.
But yea if they added better Survivability options besides stealth spam, hell even how WoW handled stealth is more preferred to this, and that had a toggleable perma stealth out of combat.