Guild Wars 2

Obsidian sanctum tower in EB is right new red keep. Just tried taking the tower and wasn’t getting credit for any of the kills! Despite what Jessica says, I assure you it has not always been like this. It’s either bugged, or the upped the no loot/xp time by a LOT. I just got credit for about 5/20 kills on red defenders, maybe its because it’s near their spawn? Either way they were actively defending so that isn’t fair. I thought those guvrds that are invulnerable to damage and deal like 20,000 damage were there for spawn camping, didn’t think we needed this

Sebrent.3625:

I’m sorry, I was replying to your latest post … not the one several back.
I’m amused you think it’s the blinks that make the difference … given that rapid fire doesn’t care if you’re close .. though a down Ranger doesn’t rapid fire … so there is that :-p

Evade works for both. Reflect only works against the projectile. Projectile destruction only works against the projectile. See how there are more that work against projectiles? That’s the difference.

Burn on block also punishes Rapid Fire. So do Retaliation and Confusion. Those hurts backstab quite a bit less.

I don’t personally care what you do with the Longbow as I am a much bigger fan of running with Sword+X / Greatsword / Shortbow … sometimes Axe+X … but Axe still doesn’t “feel right” to me.

I do think you’re massively exaggerating rapid fire given the fact that my Mesmer is eating these FotM Rangers easily and I haven’t changed from Sword+Sword/Staff with Ether Feast, Blink, Decoy, and a Cond Removal (I change that up depending on other teams’ classes) with Mass Invis as my elite. You see any reflects there? Nope. Just Blurred Frenzy, OH Sword block (and Daze), Daze from Chaos Storm, Daze from Shatters, Dodge Rolls, Distortion from Shatters and overall not sucking enough to die just because someone uses a channeled ranged ability that hits hard.

I’m also destroying them on my Warrior who can actually eat a Rapid Fire, but doesn’t do so very often thinks to blocks, interrupts, and invulnerability … on top of dodge rolls, etc.

I prefer the current Rapid Fire as it isn’t a single hit that does the full damage like the Warrior’s burst skill. Otherwise you’d have 1,500 range snipers in WvW doing what Warriors already do with their Rifles … just without the adrenaline requirement. The multiple shots makes it trivial for me. I don’t know what it’s so hard for others.

The only time it’s a pain is when I’m fighting someone else … but 2v1 is always a pain so I do not see the difference here.

Your grasp on this is as good as your grasp on the spelling of my name.

Funny that you’re amused blinks are the reason thieves beat rangers. Try just walking up to an LB ranger. Have you ever played a thief, or fought one in WvW? Prob not since you listed 900 range pistol #4 as the primary counter (rofl)

also, what don’t you understand about dodge only blocking some of rapid fire? You just said:

“Evade works for both. Reflect only works against the projectile…”

No, evade mitigates 100% of back-stab and every other burst ability I can think of. It mitigates about 30-40% of rapid fire. The advantages that RF has against evading foes outweighs the abilities that only block projectiles due to the abundance of endurance compared to projectile-blocking abilities.

also,

“Burn on block also punishes Rapid Fire. So do Retaliation and Confusion. Those hurts backstab quite a bit less.”

Burn on block? Burning doesn’t stack it pretty much does nothing extra to rapid fire. If it was bleed or torment on block you’d have a point. also confusion does not punish RF, Idk wtf you’re talking about. It procs on RF activation, not per shot. Confusion is literally 10x worse of a counter to to RF than you though it was when you posted

overall ranger is fine but this ability is over-tuned. One dodge should let me dodge the entirety of rapid fire.

asking that a long range burst skill behaves the same as other burst skills in the game regarding interactions with dodging, our main damage mitigation tool, is not a lot to ask. Not asking for reduced range, damage, or shots. Just the ability to dodge it. For compensation, the ranger can cancel channel if he sees it dodged. This change would allow rapid fire to keep its maximum potential in return for fair counter-play, and promotes more active play for the ranger and the opponent.

It’s really tough if he catches you out in the open, but in general as a power necro, I’m trying to DS #2 to his kitten asap. From there- as long as I dodge Maul (I swear every ranger is LB/GS) I can usually wreck them in melee. The hard part is having over half your hp by the time you reach him with dark path. If he blocks or dodges dark path, run and reset until its back up, its literally your only chance to get near him. alternatively you can try kiting the into a flesh golem.

I use ogre for my berserker necro, but if you’re going PVT like most MM’s suggest, I’d probably go Melandru. Ogre won’t be quite as useful on a non-zerk build ( but still good) where Melandru has that -20% stuns/conditions which is very usefull in WvW. If gold isn’t an issue definitely Melandru. When going soldiers gear (PVT) I think you should try to find the unique bonuses (suchs as minus stun duration) that you like more so than stats.

Oh I just thought of another one. IF using Warhorn and taking the Banshee’s Wail Trait. Banshee’s wail + mesmer runes gves you a 4 second aoe daze on under 30 second cooldown. OP.

tl;dr: provided going PVT stats, for runes: If using WH/banshees wail: rune of the mesmer, if not: Melandru. With a soldier’s gear MM you can almost ignore rune stats and go for the useful bonuses. Mesmer and melandru are both awesome, and there is one with a summon bird with blind thats good too.

It’s actually a l2read issue on your end. I was making the case that dodges are wayyyyyy more accessible than reflects. Back-stab is countered by dodge, RF by reflect. So, looks like you are agreeing with me here, moving on…

next you do on to talk about D/P thieves having the tools to counter rangers/rapid fire, just lol- another l2read issue on your end…. If you’ve been reading what I’m writing you’d notice that I said as a thief rangers aren’t a problem because I run with 3 blinks. I don’t even run DP and rangers are no problem. My class also however the #1 ranger counter (imo). This isn’t a thief vs ranger discussion, its a rapid fire vs backstab discussion as it relates to risk verses reward.

I just think that a move that you evade still does 6k damage (from 1500 range).

and if you’d like to make a wager as to whether RF gets nerfed in some way shape or form next patch I’’ll take you on it. Look at what everybody is crying about? Rapid fire. They always nerf that which produce the most tears.

Serbent: How do you feel about my proposed change: If you successfully evade RF, the entire ability will miss, not just the ~3-4 shots during evasion frames. This allows power rangers to retain their massive ranged damage spike, while allowing classes the ability to avoid damage if they dodge it. In it’s current form it’s – have reflect on your or bend over and take it up the butt. If you don’t like this why?

What other skills does 9k damage that requires either a reflect, or a full endurance bar to avoid damage. What burst ability period requires a double dodge roll? It’s kittening silly. Keep the damage/cooldown just let me evade the kitten thing without losing 40% hp

Amonatory.2453:

Cam Ron.4170:

Amonatory.2453:

Cam Ron.4170:

sinject.4607:

all they need to do is make larcenous strike rip two boons again and maybe make it hit slightly harder to adjust for the new frequency of use it’ll be getting from the fact it’s harder to chain/can’t be precasted now.

I think they should just give auto chain a slight damage buff so S/P gets a buff too. also I have come o to the conclusion that S/D is still viable. Want your damage back? 2/6/0/6/0. kitten trickery- great utility but I’ll take raw damage over steal cooldown/utility now that we can’t open nearly as easily with LS>Steal.

So take no trickery when trickery is the only reason thief is viable in high tier tpvp play? Makes no sense, then you have to realize that you are losing initiative because you arent taking the trickery line. Honestly you are losing dmg imo because trickery makes S/D work extremely with all the boon steal/rip, but that’s a thing of the past and s/d is not viable in tpvp matches against good players I promise.

Yea after playing with it more I just gave up on it. Larcenous strike, the main reason for running S/D in the first place, is too kitten unreliable to access.

Glad you see it my way bro. I did recently pick s/d backup even though I still thinks it’s terrible in many ways, I would much rather play it than d/p. For me d/p is not my style never was and I never liked it, so I’d rather suck with the weapon-set I have a hate/love relationship with than play the less action oriented d/p.

yea I started playing S/D in pvp like 90% of other people and actually started playing it in WvW after seeing some of your videos, and was starting to really enjoy it there until the patch hit! Now why would one ever use this in WvW (or pvp)? Opening burst cut in half, and access to the most useful and damaging ability cut to a third vs many players. For WvW I switched to the ever reliable D/D, which luckily is still awesome (esp. for hunting rangers)

If they just listened to the community nerfed feline grace/perm-vigor they could’ve added more counter-play to our spec while letting us retain the damage a thief needs to be relevant. I don’t want to completely give up on the sword (jormag’s too sexy), going to start practicing S/P.

I like to mix them close to equally:

currently using:
zerker weapons/ammy/ring (ammy rings ascended, rest exotic)

cav accessories + backpiece + boots

valk: other 5 armor items.

when traiting 2/6/6/0/0/, I get about 2500 toughness and 15.5k hp, and 35% crit chance. I use hidden killer so that 35% is a little high I think, I’m thinking about switching my weapons for valkyrie which would give me about more hp and 29% crit.

So to answer your question- I don’t know why haing one cavalier peice among the rest zerk/valk is so common, but I prefer a healthy mix of both with ideally less than 35% crit and hidden killer. HK might be my favorite trait in the game as it allows us to build valk and cavalier efficiently

For movement speed try centaur and withdraw. Perma (13s out of 15s) swiftness and +175 power. This gives me damage on my runes and lets me run 3 real utilities, plus they’re like 5silver. Withdraw isn’t even a downgrade either, great skill. It’s also +8% movement when swiftness up over signet or travelers.

also, I highly, highly recommend the quickness on crit trait over furious retaliation if you’re really looking to burst em.

also, with your crit at 50% (i.e. half the time this trait does absolutely nothing), and the revealed training trait (which doesn’t apply to back-stabs) I think executioner’s would be a better trait than hidden killer. Executioner’s and revealed training work together giving you effectively 240 power when revealed and target under 50% hp

Amonatory.2453:

Cam Ron.4170:

sinject.4607:

all they need to do is make larcenous strike rip two boons again and maybe make it hit slightly harder to adjust for the new frequency of use it’ll be getting from the fact it’s harder to chain/can’t be precasted now.

I think they should just give auto chain a slight damage buff so S/P gets a buff too. also I have come o to the conclusion that S/D is still viable. Want your damage back? 2/6/0/6/0. kitten trickery- great utility but I’ll take raw damage over steal cooldown/utility now that we can’t open nearly as easily with LS>Steal.

So take no trickery when trickery is the only reason thief is viable in high tier tpvp play? Makes no sense, then you have to realize that you are losing initiative because you arent taking the trickery line. Honestly you are losing dmg imo because trickery makes S/D work extremely with all the boon steal/rip, but thats a thing of the past and s/d is not viable in tpvp matches against good players I promise.

Yea after playing with it more I just gave up on it. Larcenous strike, the main reason for running S/D in the first place, is too kitten unreliable to access.

Sebrent.3625:

Cam Ron.4170:

RF 1500 range, backstab melee. Can be completely nullified by a dodge or aegis. BS is inaccessible with revealed debuff. Reflects are not common, neither class I play has one. RF has a shorter cool-down than every reflect/projectile destroy in the game. The fact that RF is anywhere anywhere close to BS in damage is a joke

Not many reflects in game? Really? http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Reflect

Let’s look at blocks too … ones that say “projectiles only” : http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Block

And notice, while there are plenty, it is actually missing some like Elementalist’s Swirling Winds and Mesmer’s Phantasmal Warden.

1500 Range with 4 trait points invested. 1200 without.
Can be strafed at long range unless that is bumped up to 6 trait points for Read the Wind.

10s cooldown base, 8s traited … that’s another 4 traits in a different line.
With initiative at 1/s, I don’t see much of an issue there.

Also, let’s not downplay the lack of telegraph versus an ability with a 2.5s channel time.

As far as Aegis … let’s look at the sources of it … http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Aegis
Not that many. Additionally, a Thief can simply let stealth drop when they see Aegis on their target so that they aren’t revealed… then make plans to restealth … if it’s so important to their build … some are more acrobatic.

The shortest Cool-down of the reflects? 25 seconds? RF un-traited 10s? Oh great a tell- so I can use dodge and still eat 6k damage. Back-stab is 100% nullified by the most COMMON form of damage mitigation- evading, RF is not. Even if they’re using quickness which they all do, channel is about 1.5 seconds, which a dodge still doesn’t mitigate all of the damage. Maybe it’d be balanced if they made it so if you dodge RF you dodge every shot of RF of the channel, but as of right now reflect is on triple the cooldown of RF and only certain classes have it on certain weapon sets. The fact that you need to blow a full endurance bar to evade the damage sucks.

Back stab being weaker verses evades is a lot more relevant than RF being weak verses reflects because endurance is way more accessible than reflect. Even the classes using weapons with the minimum 25 second reflect, they can dodge-roll like 6-8 times for every reflect they use.

Enjoy it for the next 6 months though, because its not making it past next balance patch

Sebrent.3625:

Ranged ability that is channeled over 2.5s versus stealth ability from behind?

Ranged can be reflected.
Ranged has a tell so can be reacted to … instead of randomly guessed.
Ranged can be stopped by projectile destruction.
Channeling can be interrupted by daze/stun/knockdown/etc.

Yep, sounds balanced.

If going to list points … don’t forget some :-p

RF 1500 range, backstab melee. Can be completely nullified by a dodge or aegis. BS is inaccessible with revealed debuff. Reflects are not common, neither class I play has one. RF has a shorter cool-down than every reflect/projectile destroy in the game. The fact that RF is anywhere anywhere close to BS in damage is a joke.

I play thief mostly so its not that bad for me, the 1v1 match-up is about even now since I have a lot of blinks to close the gap, but other classes are kittened and RF is more of a threat to them than backstab

Jessica Boettiger.2563:

GreenAlien.5623:

What is the reason for that mechanic?

The purpose of this mechanic has always been to mitigate spawn camping, kill trading, and as an added benefit, it also discourages botting.

The threshold of time before a player is worth WXP (and now also XP/Loot) has not changed, and is low enough that it is almost always the case that a player’s death will award WXP and loot in the time it takes for them to run from a portal keep to a nearby objective.

Can you tell us what the threshold is? also it would be helpful if players have an icon showing I will not get credit so I can choose a different target. also I don’t think this effects spawn campers much at all as loot/exp isn’t their motivation in the first place.

also are sure nothing has been changed? i never even knew you couldn’t get credit for kills until this week, it is happening all the time. If nothing was intentionally changed there is definitely a bug because I’m not getting credit often, when before this week I’ve never noticed it happen

Unconditional ranged tracking channel (RF) outdamages a melee burst attack that must meet TWO conditions: attack from behind and from stealth. Sounds balanced

Steb.2571:

Sad to see you go, good luck frand. Sadly, one less thief in high tier spvp, our numbers are dwindling rapidly.

But S/D needed to be nerfed, and it got what it needed. As I’ve said in various other places on the forums, it’s not that S/D is now suddenly terrible, it’s that many classes are so obscenely broken by contrast that it skews the perception of balance quite drastically. S/D is now balanced, Unfortunately, the things you’ll be going up against won’t be.

Balance in a game is also relative to other things in that same game. Things aren’t overpowered or underpowered n a vacuum. That is why this statement: “it’s not that S/D is now suddenly terrible, it’s that many classes are so obscenely broken by contrast that it skews the perception of balance quite drastically. S/D is now balanced, Unfortunately, the things you’ll be going up against won’t be” kinda contradicts itself

If other classes he is playing against are “obscenely broken” compared to his own than by definition it is underpowered.

style.6173:

TheFamster.7806:

style.6173:

Windsagio.1340:

Harbinger.8637:

You only play soloq if you’re a masochist.

I presume that it’s people that want to consider themselves more serious (or just want more rewards) than hotjoin and (reasonably) don’t want to go through the effort of joining/making a team.

To me it’s the real redheaded stepchild, a halfway point between play-for-fun hotjoin and play-to-be-competitive team.

I don’t understand why everyone doesn’t just solo into team queue. Better rewards, and unless you are a to player, you will still be fighting pug vs pug

I thought you can only join team Q with a 2 or more members… I also thought team Q was for hardcore/good pvpers so I’ve been refraining from going solo. I only go there when I have full party of guild members.

No and no. Play there solo. Plus no skyhammer or spirit watch.

WOW! You can join team Q solo? LOL. Never playing soloQ again with those two kitten maps. Thank-you for thee info! PS: am I the only one that thinks spiritwatch is WORSE than skyhammer? Weird how they put the maps that require the most amount of teamwork in soloq but not team Q. Nothing worse than watching your team zerg raven while the other team runs orbs. I also still get teams that don’t know orb scores are worth more on your own point. Then again I cant really blame them because the game never attempts to explain how it works

Azawrath.7304:

Everyone would rather have 2 necros or 2 warriors or 2 engis or 2 of anything expect for 2 thieves in Spvp.

as a thief/necro player I always hope for guards engis on my team. and I agree thiefs may be my least faorite to see in 2’s, but I love 1 good thief on the team

Einlanzer.1627:

My biggest complaint about the Thief class is and always has been that Stealth is not well implemented. In some situations it’s overpowered to the point that it makes Thieves seem like an overpowered class, but most of the time its defensive utility is very poor and completely fails to justify why Thieves have such horrible attrition.

good point and this might be the crux of it. stealth is great i WvW, but in CONQUEST it’s obviously weaker…. which is why its strange revealed is longer in pvp than WvW….. should be the other way around if different at all. if there really are new game modes coming that will definitely help stealth in pvp

evilapprentice.6379:

Cam Ron.4170:

evilapprentice.6379:

Before you read – this is from a PvP perspective, and isn’t intended to knock any of the classes mentioned.

You’ve consistently nerfed thieves across the board.

You removed their instant burst because it was “too strong”, then eventually gave similar capabilities to ele’s.

You removed their sustain/burst by nerfing S/D, but had no issue giving rangers the equivalent of a ranged Backstab that can sustain pressure with their auto attack.

You’ve consistently nerfed access to our only defensive abilities (Stealth, blind, evade), with no practically useful buffs to take their place.

When the game was released, it was fine that thieves had awful sustain, no protection/stability/blocks/immune skills, the lowest HP pool, and a design which made any spec other than burst a losing gambit both in playstyle and mathematically.

That is no longer the case – you’ve nerfed thieves to the point where something needs to change. We can’t reliably use our skills for damage (lol, FS is so telegraphed anyone could dodge/block it) or for defense (literally any spec can no just stand in BP and still maul a thief now). Damage that was considered “Too good” for thieves to have (despite their lack of sustain skills) now exists on other classes (who have the option to go immune, block, and better healing options). Stealth is a joke (for defensive purposes) in SPvP and TPvP by your design, making 1 of our entire traitlines borderline useless in that game mode.

It’s time to sit down and figure out what you want thieves to do – it clearly isn’t burst damage. Why bring a D/P glass thief to an AoE fest point fight, who has to care about positioning and what to do after his BS lands when a ranger can safely deliver that damage from half a battlefield away? Why run D/D (A notably UP set which has a Condi based skill right in the middle of what is a clearly a power/crit set) for that instant burst when an Ele can do it with better options for sustain afterwards?

What is it you want thieves to do, besides generate misinformed forum QQ?

Buff or change dancing dagger
make revealed duration the same as WvW
speed up sword auto-chain by 10% or 10% damage.
Fix the ungodly amount of teleport bugs.

Thief fixed

Not to be rude, but none of these changes address the underlying issue with thief design. We don’t need minor buffs to specific skills, we need Anet to decide what exactly it is they want thief to do, then make changes to support that role.

that wasn’t rude, its a good discussion. I think we’re supposed to be high-single target damage dealers using dodges/teleports for defense. Our biggest advantages over other classes in PvP is our mobility. Perhaps they see us as the backcapping roamers that zip around the map and help when needed, and that is how I try to play it. I feel that in solo q, decision making is more important for a thief than any other class (we can act on it and get to where we think we need to be the quickest).

I think we need to wait a little longer before we call the thief underpowered (and im the guy that made a thread titles “thief is now worst class in pvp”, but that was before the steal bug fix ad before I played a lot on it)

as far as the new classes we’re seeing? zerk LB rangers are sooo easy for my thief to kill (teleports op), but they give my necro nightmares. More medi guards sucks tho. I only play theif and necro, and while necro is really strong, my thief feels in a better spot for the simple fact that there are like 3 zerker rangers per team every game. Thief got nerfed but the soloQ meta got buffed nicely for them.

evilapprentice.6379:

Before you read – this is from a PvP perspective, and isn’t intended to knock any of the classes mentioned.

You’ve consistently nerfed thieves across the board.

You removed their instant burst because it was “too strong”, then eventually gave similar capabilities to ele’s.

You removed their sustain/burst by nerfing S/D, but had no issue giving rangers the equivalent of a ranged Backstab that can sustain pressure with their auto attack.

You’ve consistently nerfed access to our only defensive abilities (Stealth, blind, evade), with no practically useful buffs to take their place.

When the game was released, it was fine that thieves had awful sustain, no protection/stability/blocks/immune skills, the lowest HP pool, and a design which made any spec other than burst a losing gambit both in playstyle and mathematically.

That is no longer the case – you’ve nerfed thieves to the point where something needs to change. We can’t reliably use our skills for damage (lol, FS is so telegraphed anyone could dodge/block it) or for defense (literally any spec can no just stand in BP and still maul a thief now). Damage that was considered “Too good” for thieves to have (despite their lack of sustain skills) now exists on other classes (who have the option to go immune, block, and better healing options). Stealth is a joke (for defensive purposes) in SPvP and TPvP by your design, making 1 of our entire traitlines borderline useless in that game mode.

It’s time to sit down and figure out what you want thieves to do – it clearly isn’t burst damage. Why bring a D/P glass thief to an AoE fest point fight, who has to care about positioning and what to do after his BS lands when a ranger can safely deliver that damage from half a battlefield away? Why run D/D (A notably UP set which has a Condi based skill right in the middle of what is a clearly a power/crit set) for that instant burst when an Ele can do it with better options for sustain afterwards?

What is it you want thieves to do, besides generate misinformed forum QQ?

Buff or change dancing dagger
make revealed duration the same as WvW
speed up sword auto-chain by 10% or 10% damage.
Fix the ungodly amount of teleport bugs.

Thief fixed

sinject.4607:

all they need to do is make larcenous strike rip two boons again and maybe make it hit slightly harder to adjust for the new frequency of use it’ll be getting from the fact it’s harder to chain/can’t be precasted now.

I think they should just give auto chain a slight damage buff so S/P gets a buff too. also I have come o to the conclusion that S/D is still viable. Want your damage back? 2/6/0/6/0. kitten trickery- great utility but I’ll take raw damage over steal cooldown/utility now that we can’t open nearly as easily with LS>Steal.

2/6/0/6/0 new s/d meta. Steal combo isn’t as good so trading trickery utility for raw damage

Rudy.6184:

@Cam Ron – yup the stealth can be broken cause of autoatack and even when enemy walks into a trap too fast. It is worth go without any stunbreak on thief? Without a shadowstep you’ll be locked down and die. Tried the fullcondi spec, works even better then hybrid, cause on non-squishy targets it has too little pressure (hybrid one). Also it would be nice if the second minor SA trait would work on trap stealth. And about multitargeting – it usually works on one target.

as far as the stun break question- runes are still really good even with two traps (short cd) and I’d recommend bringing shadowstep if planing on playing very risky/outnumbered (stealing into large groups). However in most cases I rune 3 traps and run 2/0/0/6/6 with assassin’s equilibrium. I bet 90% of poeople think I’m nuts for not going Sa but I love feline grace especially with with uncatchable trait, and 2s of stability while I’m using my channeled sneak attack has saved me a lot.=, especially with so much stealth access. also between swiftness on dodge, withdraw, infiltrator’s arrow (+vigor on heal if you trait that instead of pain response) you can get around just fine without any + movement speed.

also, never realized how useful ambush thief is, best part is how your thief throw scorpion wire.

Steb.2571:

You guys misunderstand, it’s dead in the sense that everyone and their mom can play it with braindead skill level. It’s not dead in the practical sense, it can still be run, but it’s more in line with what it should be. You should have to hit a flip skill to actually flip it. If anything, it allows you to trolololol evade spam your kitten in the opposite direction if your under fire. People are just mad that braindead spec’s get nerfed.

Signet of agility is overpowered when paired with acrobatics, and it makes it impossible to accurately count dodges. It allows for very little counter-play because pretty much any and all predictability is gone, and you just have to play entirely reactionary. That’s dumb, and this just aids in killing that. Agility needs to follow suit, I would rather it turn into either a heavier condi clear, or a disable of some kind to allow for cleaner setup and burst landing.

Acrobatics alone is fine, but when you combine feline, with vigor, with signet, it gets a bit kittened. DD needs a buff, PP needs a buff, Celestial and Engi’s / eles / necro / warrior need a nerf, etc,etc,etc. There’s too much sustain at the moment, and it makes thieves less valuable by contrast, but having kittened kitten on thief doesn’t help solve the problem, it just adds to the joke that is Spvp balance right now.

You sound like a D/P main that thought S/D was stronger, which I don’t believe was the case. Before S/D was the only thief set that could compete, but now D/P seems to be the only viable set, and you’re happy for that? why?

also, since feline grace restores a lot of endurance for free anyway, the Signet’s active actually does less for an acro build than any other build, so lol.

Kolly.9872:

Renegade.6240:

I read the recent topics and I see that almost everyone thinks S/D and D/D is dead, P/P is already a joke, P/D is only useful against melees in 1v1 situations, that only leaves D/P which I don’t know much about, fail much, and think its not very reliable too
Woah forgot the S/P, may be good in PvE but don’t even worth trying in WvW and sPvP

I think I’m playing a different game then, since I can play S\P effectively in PvP and WvW
D\P and P\D are as strong as before
D\D only needs some little fix for being in par with the other 2 sets
P\P is still the same useless weapon set, definitely need some changes
The only part of this patch I realy don’t get is the change to FS\LS: people were crying on perma dodge and A-Net decided to buff it and to nerf the damage.
and P\P

S/P, while it can be effective in PvP, isn’t that good, or I just suck.

d/d is fine in WvW, but there is ZERO reason to EVER use it in PvP due to D/P.

agree about p/d in and d/p in WvW, both great. P/d aint good in pvp though.

for s/d- please do not try to twist this into some sort off half buff, half nerf thing. It is objectively a way weaker set.

tl;dr to answer OP: For WvW you got a lot of options. for PvP, learn D/P

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

Whoever gave the ranger the ability to produce 3 clones of it self and burst for 9k should be slapped.

Whoever gave the ranger the ability to stealth and backstab you for 9K damage, and try repeatedly if you block should be slapped.

Whoever gave the ranger the ability to use total immunity to physical damage and conditions and eviscerate you for 9K should be shot.

However gave the ranger the ability to CC you with updraft and spawn 7 boons and lightning flash spike you 9k damage should be shot.

Whoever gave ……….

The last time my backstab did 9k damage was 2012

Steb.2571:

I’m glad S/D is dead. Personally, I wish signet of agility died too. It can still be used, just not in the same overpowered fashion. Given, it was never more overpowered than engi’s or necros after the infiltrators nerf, but it still shouldn’t have existed. Nor should Current engi’s or necros. People screamed “We can’t sustain!” and Anet decided to just make it so they have so much sustain and damage, they can just peel for themselves with no sacrifices needed, it’s ridiculous.

I agree, D/P should be the only viable weapon-set for PvP thieves, S/d had no place there. Variety is stupid and ruining GW2.

also, signet of agility is just as good as ever so I don’t understand that comment

LOL. God kitten I never wished I had an asura until now, that looks hilarious. Please hunt LB rangers with it

Jagstang.6912:

then you just might need to learn to evade/reflect/run up to him and just hit him.

evade:
You need to use 2 dodges, I.E. your entire endurance bar to avoid damage.

reflect:
I play thief and necromancer, out of all my reflect options: which do you suggest for rangers? Idk why people suggest reflect like it’s a core mechanic of every class.

run up to him and just hit him:
if you try to run up to a ranger who opens on you from 1500 range, you won’t get halfway before dying,. If you do, that means he is tank spec or isn’t wearing any gear/jewelry

Not ready to flat out call LB rangers OP yet, patch is too fresh, but I’m certainly leaning towards it.

I just don’t understand why it does double backstab damage at MUCH less risk.

nopoet.2960:

I would rather they added a see invisible instead of forcing revealed.

wow, this is actually a great idea. allows counter-play to stealth, yet still allows us to try to get a stealth attack off. They may have to make it longer like 6s to 8s to compensate, but I’d prefer that then the current iteration

kiwiburner.2186:

Kurama.8453:

Cam Ron.4170:

Swiftness buff on scepter

what buff?

Can only assume they’re talking about the warhorn swiftness duration, which suggests to me that they don’t use scepter or warhorn

As far as I’m concerned, the pinging effect on that warhorn swiftness (that puts you in combat with all and sundry trash mobs) ends up as a run speed nerf.. I am glad to have just made the change from scepter/warhorn to axe/dagger.

so because I accidentally said the wrong weapon, it means I don’t use it? OK. It was clearly a mistake as scepter has never had swiftness, so how could it be buffed? If anything, it shows your lack of familiarity of the class if you thought I was actually referring to a scepter swiftness buff

also trash mobs are the last thing I’m worried about in WvW or pvp combat.

I don’t play MM, but I think war-horn /dagger are so much better than focus unless playing vs all guards/eles, but focus seems to be the most common. Boon strip is great, but the cast times are horrendous! WH has a sweet aoe daze, some lifeforce generation and swiftness, and dagger is godly verses zerker builds (multi-target blind and weakness). Surprised at how much more common focus seems to be than the other two.

I switched my dagger for WH in WvW, but am sticking with offhand dagger in pvp. I don’t play MM but I would use dagger on that build as well

trapper runes are pretty broken atm, I suggest slapping those o if you’re playing p/d

Why not win/loss record? That’s all that matters

soften and herd them into a group with short, once they’re all close to 50% hp and bunched up steal+cleave em

alright, so my P/D just put on these beautiful little runes last night. I’m in love! Running ambush, needle trap and tripwire, ambush on 28 CD the other on 24s CD. Even if nobody steps on my traps (they always do though), the speed + free sneak attack really lets me put more presure on. If I’m in a 1v1 and they step on trip wire its GG.

If you have a condi thief, try these runes and ditch your shadow refuge+stun breaks for traps, its so fun. Reveal technically “counter” it, but not really- its a cooldown trade and I’ll get a free stealth before their reveal is up again. Just don’t make the mistake of dorpping a trap while revealed, easy to do on accident.

also, you need to toggle auto attack off- if you drop trap while autoing, you’ll go stealth in the middle of your auto animation and you will not get a free sneak attack

KrazyFlyinChicken.5936:

Hey guys,

I’m back after a long hiatus just to see what the status of the game is like post-patch.

One thing that has been worrying me…. I have played probably a dozen solo-queue games so far. I’m not trying to be narcissistic here, but with little-to-no effort I am already topping the leaderboard.

3 months ago, it used to be a major struggle for me to break into the top 1k players on the leaderboard. This is no longer true. Just by messing around with builds, I have managed to worm my way into the top 200. I don’t think I’m that good… which means something is up.

Are there just so few players now that the top 1k leaderboard is filled with inactives? Are people just bad? Did everyone get nerfed except elementalists (and rangers?)

What the heck.

Some guy in the top 20 is 10-5, its a joke. I judge people based on their winrate/games played instead of the leaderboard, and you should too

tichorum.2415:

I am glad you are quitting Guild Wars 2. We could use less of people like you, to be honest.

In other news, I like this patch. It’s new meta time and lots of builds are yet to be discovered. I’m quite excited.

Pretty much this. I’m still a little salty about S/D thief, and LB rangers in WvW are starting to get a little annoying- but overall its exciting. Despite the potential new imbalance issues that arise it’s fun playing around with new builds and such.

btw- anybody see the new trapper runes? Game changing!

Keksmuffin.1450:

Cam Ron.4170:

Keksmuffin.1450:

Anonymouse.4760:

evilapprentice.6379:

Phaeton.9582:

evilapprentice.6379:

spec X having an advantage over Spec Y has no value (with some exceptions of course – if spec Y was designed to counter Spec X and it doesnt, well, then you have a problem)

Anonymouse.4760:

Meditations guardians, arguably one of thieves biggest counters with the great amount of blinds and blocks they receive from profession abilities.

I think you have your answer friend

Well then I do apologize – my bad.

Though I don’t necessarily agree that a spec with alot of blinds and blocks is necessarily strong against one with good single condition mitigation and a strong unblockable attack. I can see how a medi guard would be strong against D/P, but not S/D.

True, or at least it used to be, without being able to precast larcenous anymore we have no real counter the amount of aegis guardians have. previously we could precast flanking and attempt to get close for larcenous to take the aegis which could be blinded or evaded, but this at least gave us a chance at getting the upper hand on the opener against the medi guard but now we are left to sit there and attempt to proc it with a dancing dagger (very easily dodged) or move in close and take heavy burst damage while trying to auto it away ( easily blinded ). and regarding shelter, well as i said before unless we can land a flanking within 4 seconds of when they use their heal, might as well just give up trying to interrupt that with a basilisk larcenous. If any of you reading this have attempted to fight a competent medi guard on s/d post patch I’m sure you’ve seen first hand how a weapon set that used to be good for dealing with them is now hard countered by them.

You can still use steal, it steals aegis before it hits. I didn’t play too much after patch but from the duels I had with s/d thieves so far I have to say that they are pretty much freekill for dps guard now if the thief doesn’t hit like every 4s daze thingy.

2 second daze actually, but yea- I’ve found I need to incorporate a lot more CnD -> daze into your playstyle to be effective on S/D. also I rather pop aegis with dancing dagger or SB so I can be guaranteed to steal his kitten retaliation, thats what really kills me every time. Idk tho I get wrecked by med guards, our natural counter

I’m talking about the ability that thieves steal from guardians.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mace_Head_Crack

4 seconds :<

Holy moly, never realized it was 4 seconds! that’s massive. It seems really hard to land (cast time feels longer than the advertised 1/4second) but I am pretty careless with it, gotta make sure I land that now. Next duel I get into with guard im popping on mesmer runes. 5.5 sec daze inc!

nekretaal.6485:

None of the classes are awful.

Other games have classes that are no-play in Pvp and guild wars 2 really does better than this.

If you want to be serious, though, high end Pvp is mostly about rotating & mobility to cause mismatches, and so if you want to get good, learn to play mobile specs, such as classes with leaps or teleports.

agree nd if you’re not sure what role you want to play for your team- go Ele IMO, they are so versatile and can do well in any role.

Keksmuffin.1450:

Anonymouse.4760:

evilapprentice.6379:

Phaeton.9582:

evilapprentice.6379:

spec X having an advantage over Spec Y has no value (with some exceptions of course – if spec Y was designed to counter Spec X and it doesnt, well, then you have a problem)

Anonymouse.4760:

Meditations guardians, arguably one of thieves biggest counters with the great amount of blinds and blocks they receive from profession abilities.

I think you have your answer friend

Well then I do apologize – my bad.

Though I don’t necessarily agree that a spec with alot of blinds and blocks is necessarily strong against one with good single condition mitigation and a strong unblockable attack. I can see how a medi guard would be strong against D/P, but not S/D.

True, or at least it used to be, without being able to precast larcenous anymore we have no real counter the amount of aegis guardians have. previously we could precast flanking and attempt to get close for larcenous to take the aegis which could be blinded or evaded, but this at least gave us a chance at getting the upper hand on the opener against the medi guard but now we are left to sit there and attempt to proc it with a dancing dagger (very easily dodged) or move in close and take heavy burst damage while trying to auto it away ( easily blinded ). and regarding shelter, well as i said before unless we can land a flanking within 4 seconds of when they use their heal, might as well just give up trying to interrupt that with a basilisk larcenous. If any of you reading this have attempted to fight a competent medi guard on s/d post patch I’m sure you’ve seen first hand how a weapon set that used to be good for dealing with them is now hard countered by them.

You can still use steal, it steals aegis before it hits. I didn’t play too much after patch but from the duels I had with s/d thieves so far I have to say that they are pretty much freekill for dps guard now if the thief doesn’t hit like every 4s daze thingy.

2 second daze actually, but yea- I’ve found I need to incorporate a lot more CnD → daze into your playstyle to be effective on S/D. also I rather pop aegis with dancing dagger or SB so I can be guaranteed to steal his kitten retaliation, thats what really kills me every time. Idk tho I get wrecked by med guards, our natural counter

Cynz.9437:

Phaeton.9582:

•Thief: •Steal: Fixed an issue in which thieves were unable to hit with this ability while using a movement skill.

nothing got fixed, HS + steal still works only half of the time, BP+ HS+ steal doesn’t work properly and ports you back
was taken yesterday…. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ONcJFPEaqek

they basically reduced the range of HS+steal combo, and unfortunately I think its intentional. I wvs testing it and it seemed to always work only if my HS was within the 900 steal range, where previously, you could HS into steal range.

as for porting back on steal, this bug IS NOT exclusive to HS+steal, this has happened to me many times prepatch on multiple weaponsets.

tl;dr: The combo works within 900 range, the max range of this combo has been reduced by the range of HS

Kitt.2567:

buff in need class : Guardian

0/10

How do you decide on where to rotate and why?

I go for points I think are uncontested because im fast as shlt and backcapping wins soloq. If someone is bunkering a point, then Ill roam nd make it a 5v4 elsewhere on the map

How do you decide on who to target and why?

Necro, thieves, ele. (guard). Necros first because many are power and do a lot of damage, and mostly because you want to finish them before they can generate too much lifeforce. They are much easier to kill at the start of a fight. Thieves and eles next simply because if zerker they are easy to down. If on organized team going for guardian is a good idea too as they have the best rez mechanics.

What are the biggest mistakes you see new players make?

2 people capping a completely uncontested empty point. Kinda anets fault for rewarding them with points for that stupidity though.

What are the top 3 bunkers in your opinion?
Guard, Ele, Engi

What are the top 3 DPS classes in your opinion?
Thief, Mesmer, Ranger (single target). Ele, necro (aoe)

My opinion

Tier 1- Guardian, Engineer , Elementalist

Tier 2- The rest

This is strictly from my opinion from an unorganized soloQ standpoint. Ranger might creep its way up there

Balance schmalance . It’s important, but for me, getting a new mode like 3v3 or arena is wayyyy more important. Plus balancing is hard, never played a balanced online pvp that has any semblance of variety

laquito.5269:

S/D is just as good as before, only thing that changed is that it isn’t a nobrainer anymore. It actually even got a slight “denerf/buff” with the flanking strike + steal bugfix.

what? the old combo was steal + Larcenous strike, now you can’t open with that. Steal+ flanking strike is awful, it’s so telegraphed all it does is give the enemy an obvious tell so they can dodge your steal. Better off precasting CnD now and going for daze proc into flanking strike imo. Been having way more success doing this

I’m not ready to say the set is not viable yet, but to say its as good as before is just crazy

Merlin Dyfed Avalon.5046:

Tbh. Nerf duration not damage.. I feel more punishment is in order when attacking something with that obvious boon.

I say ramp up damage to 50%

I agree!! Less duration, more damage.

alchemyst.2165:

Cam Ron.4170:

alchemyst.2165:

Actually I was thinking about trying the evasion runes. I think they would work great, but for my playstyle I’d rather have more swiftness uptime and more power. Honestly though I think they’d work great. You might lose some dps though, since you’re getting ferocity instead of power and power > ferocity but I’m sure there are ways around it.

Love the build, I like it better than SA build for small scale battles.

And why not strength runes + might on dodge/endurance regen food? I think that’s the superior setup for DPS.

Also, you may want to consider assassin’s equilibrium trait, I’m certainly enjoying it

That’s a great question. It’s mostly because I like the extra swiftness, fury and might buff from the 4 on pack runes, and also because I’m trying to save money for Incinerator Also I feel Pack runes are also more versatile between builds, since I switch builds a lot.

But I might buy them once I have spare money.

And thanks for the feedback

Yea, stick with pack if you like to switch builds a lot, most versatile thief rune. but as long as you have shadow’s embrace traited, I’d definitely give assasin’s equilibrium a shot over pain response (though PR is good option too, I just hate getting pulled/knocked down!)

and HIGHLY recommend dodge food, regardless of runes. I like this food on all non-shadow arts power builds

Ergolicious.1507:

It’s hilarious how wrong are such a large amount of Thiefs (even the OP’s top 50 whatever..). This build is actually stronger than before because you can now, literally, pema evade while still doing a lot of damage with your auto attack (I never counted on lacernous strike to do the dps for me before, flanking strike as here to close the gap/evade a big skill from your opponent… autoattack hits harder and procs more sigil).

This build has become even more cancerous and is even harder to deal with…. yet so many thiefs are complaining, christ…

In the end, a lot of Thiefs are leaving their char because of this patch because they don’t understand the change and that won’t bother anyone, on the contrary

Lol @ auto attacks doing more than larcenous. A lot of people have been saying that but its completely false. Sure maybe PvE style standing still for 10 seconds spamming 1 outdamages spamming 3, but in a practical usage during PvP carefully time LS strikes were the key to bursting, particularly in the opening sequence.

I’m starting to incorporate more CnD into my playstyle to daze and get guaranteed land on 3

evilapprentice.6379:

Cam Ron.4170:

D/P is absolutely fine, just dont stomp anymore. S/D is clearly weaker and may just get completely overshadowed by D/P, or maybe I just need to l2p and adapt to changes better. Definitely not effective as i use to be yet (if ever). I haven’t played P/P enough to have an opinion of this set post-buff.

tl;dr: DP is fine
jury is out on S/D, definitely weaker, possibly viable

everything else as always been crap compared to these sets on PvP.

In WvW however, new trap runes + dire gear is absurd at the moment.

You don’t need to play P/P to understand that the “buff” did nothing to help the set, Anet very helpfully let you know the change would be pointless from the getgo because it’s not based on any of the issues P/P currently has.

D/P is still a functional set, it’s just that BP went from a skill that could be used defensively to a 6 init smoke field for stealth access and the occasional whirling axe.

regarding p/p:
its essentially like a 20% damage increase for the set’ main damage ability. i didn’t pay P/P prebuff so I don’t have a great understanding of the kits inherent problems. I’ll take your word for it until trying it out more.

Regarding DP
Yea, 6 ini is expensive, perhaps they should make it 5. However, even its its only used for stealth, the skill at 6 ini is still more useful than 2/5ths of D/D set’s skills. Also, d/p can still blind just fine with #3. It was way too good at stomping people in its previous state. A non-utility gated only by initiative shouldn’t be that powerful a stomping tool for a class that is so good at getting a single target down, i think the change was warranted, but perhaps they should lower the cost to 5 initiative- itd still be a net nerf