Guild Wars 2

bhagwad.4281:

Eduardo.4675:

OP, I dont believe you a single bit. Im almost sure you are lying. The only way a mesmer achieves 2800 armor is by adding 964 tufness, and im pretty sure there is no build out there (on a mesmer) that recommends adding 1K tufness. If you have a build with shaman amulet on a mesmer, thats a very weird build, and in that case i dont believe you know how to fight thieves. You would need 300 points from traits + amulet and jewel with tufness as secondary stat to achive 2780 armor, which is still 20 tufness shy of 2800. So, what do you have to say?

Doesn’t matter if you disbelieve me. I just added another screenshot with my hero stats.

Looks like your wearing the berserker’s amulet… you have 900 toughness… and your a cloth wearer, so weakest base defense…

Well, mesmers have 15k base HP, he has about 300 vitality it seems. (The same as berserker’s adds.)

Looks like hes wearing the berserker’s amulet, if he wore the toughness one, he would need soldiers, and that would be more vitality.

bhagwad.4281:

Now let me make it clear that I know how to fight thieves. I know how to try and avoid a backstab when they stealth. But I first have to know they’re there! I have to know I’m fighting one. I have 17k health and 2800 armor.

This just happened to me. Never saw him coming. Didn’t even know he was there. I don’t care what the design philosophy is, this just shouldn’t be possible.

Exactly what skill is required to pull this off? Downing a player from full health in literally zero time?

Anet – what exactly the kitten are you doing about this?

Don’t use Frenzy.
Get Toughness.
Use a Stun breaker.
Get more defensive abilities.
Put defensive things on your Utility Slot.

Adaneshade.2409:

The key to using those abilities is not to get your entire group in them.

But no other class in the game can bring such a detriment to your group.

And Last Refuge can activate regardless if you want it to or not.

Why are you using Venoms?

Some times when fighting bosses, my stealth, if it stealths everyone, with traits like “Last Refuge.” and “Shadow Refuge”, it resets the boss.

It makes thieves more of a detriment to the group, especially if I try and stealth rez someone, cloaking the entire group and the encounter resets.

We are already very low survivability in dungeons, we arn’t the best DPS, and we have almost no group utility.

Kali.6209:

but that wasn’t the point. I want a legitimate way of obtaining the gear. not an exploit. And also that would require levling another thief up to atleast lvl 5 because you can’t transmute items above your level

1. Its not an exploit.
2. Yes you can.

Skyblue.9358:

No. OP may not think of a problem:

Culture armor are nice looking to that race just because designer don’t need to consider body size / features of other races. They can put more details to the culture armor so it looks perfectly suit to that race.

If you want an armor fit to all races, then designer need to consider more, they may need to take out some design elements because it just impossible to fit all races. So the culture may not look that nice as now.

You must not have ever worked with armor or mods before, each model on each race is different, so it would not effect that race at all, so each race needs to have unique models for each body-type, and this is probably why cultural armor isn’t available to all races. “yet.”

They would have to make 72 * 6 models for each race, per race and armor set, which is probably why the weapons are available, but the armor is not, such a thing would take awile, but could be on there list of things to do in the future.

This would also include extra textures, such as Shaders/The Models own Texture, and the Alpha texture, which is 72 * 6 * 6 * 6.

It is a lot of work, which is probably why they only made it available to one race per cultural set.

nerva.7940:

Wait is this change in or are u proposing it? Shouldnt siphoning scale with healing power?

Why healing power? it does damage more then heals., it should be condition damage.

This mainly applies to Thief and Necromancer, it would change the way some of there healing skills work.

Life Stealing is now effected by Condition Damage. (this makes sense because condition damage ignores armor, and so does life stealing.)

(This means all traits that steal life, are improved based on the condition damage of the thief or necromancer.)

Thief
Signet of Malice – Now also steals life.
(This would allow the thief a bit more builds and backbone in SPVP.)
5% of all condition damage, increases the heal of Signet of Malice.

Necromancer
All traits that steal or drain life, are now effected by Condition Damage.

HUGE fix, this would give necromancers a lot more viable builds.

Besides increasing the heals, stealing life ignores armor, so why not make it be effected by “Condition Damage.”, since its pretty much conditional damage?

Vampiric Precision:
At level 80, grants about 32 + (0.125 * Condition Damage) health per critical hit. Unaffected by Healing Power.

Vampiric
At level 80, heals for 25 + (0.095 * Condition Damage) health per hit. Unaffected by Healing Power.

Vampiric Rituals
At level 80, heals the player for 42 + (0.175 * Condition Damage) health per enemy affected (up to five targets), per pulse, per well. Unaffected by Healing Power.

The condition damage makes the life stolen more, and gives the necromancer more healing.

I have two ideas on the table, one of them improves the numbers, and one of them improves stealing life based on condition damage.

Vampiric Precision.
At level 80, grants about 164 health per critical hit or 246 health with the trait Bloodthirst.

Vampiric
Heals for 164 HP at level 80 or 246 HP with the Bloodthirst trait.

Vampiric Rituals
At level 80, heals the player for 164 health per enemy affected (up to five targets), per pulse, per well. Unaffected by Healing Power.

(This is now effected by Bloodthirst, and heals for 246 per pulse.)

Necromancers have no Mobility, they cannot run away like other classes and healing power does not even effect most of our traits, we deserve to have good sustain. (as the class says we should.) but its stupid that we don’t have nearly the healing we deserve to have.

nerva.7940:

Healing needs to scale better with siphoning. Siphoning is useless in pvp

Siphoning needs upgraded a lot, due to lack of mobility.

I agree on all points, these changes are amazing, some of them sound like mine.

Consume Conditions should be a corruption skill though.

Elias.3204:

What’s the survivability of the Necromancer like compared to the other caster professions (Elementalist and Mesmer)? Pertaining to both WvW and PvE.

Not very good, Elementalist and Mesmer can run, while necromancers cannot.

Auesis.7301:

I like the ideas here, although I have always been wary about the spamming potential of initiative-based skills like Crippling Blast. At just 3 initiative, you could keep a target snared for literally 100% uptime, and considering the relatively high damage you have attached to the skill (in comparison to the autoattack, anyway), it may be a problem.

Even with the amount of condition removal we have in this game?

Eh, your right though, I will change it.

I also added that while in camo, you can’t move.

2 seconds is enough, and it adds up if you spam it.

Shadow Clone would also be a fun ability, but it would probably be powerful, because you could wear somebody down with just Shadow Clone, it can be abusive when combined with stealth, since your clone’s attacks wouldn’t reveal you.

This creates a Sniper, kind of like the ones from Caudecus’s Manor. (would suck if it was reflected back though..)

Rifle Thief

Full Auto:
Shoot repeatedly at your foe. The farther away they are, the more damage you deal.
Damage < 300 (3x): 201
Damage 300-600 (3x): 249
Damage 600-900 (3x): 300
Damage > 900 (3x): 348
Combo Finisher: Physical Projectile (20%)
Range: 1,200

(Stealthed.) Shadowy Retreat.
Teleport away from your target, gaining swiftness.
Swiftness: 15 s
___________
(3 Initiative.) Crippling Blast:
Cripple your foe with a Crippling Blast.
Damage: 368
Cripple: 2 s
Combo Finisher: Physical Projectile
Range: 1,200
___________
(4 Initiative.) Shadow Clone:
Stealth, summoning a clone that casts Full Auto.
Stealth: 3s.
___________
(5 Initiative.) Rifle Butt:
Push your foe back with your rifle butt.
Damage: 386
Knockback: 450
Range: 130
___________
(6 Initiative.) Camouflage:
Hide in Shadows.
Immobilize: 24h (Self.)
Camouflage: 24 h
Frenzy: 24h (You take 50% more damage.)
Revealed if Damaged, or Enemy comes within 180 Meters of you.

(12-15 Initiative, can only be used while Camouflaged.) Sniper Shot:
(5 second cast, ends cast if person is too close.)
Burn all your initiative, unleashing a blast that pierces and destroys your foes, does more damage to moving targets.
Damage per Initiative: 121. (If target is not moving.)
Damage per Initiative: 202. (If target is moving.)
Damage per Initiative: 303. (If target is downed.)
Revealed: 10s.
Combo Finisher: Physical Projectile
Range: 500-2,500.

Thieves don’t have a rifle… :/

I want Toughness, Precision, Critical Bonus.

That would be an amazing idea, a month long hard quest that takes hours = precursor, one per character, you can keep or sell.

Landing a good backstab is much harder then it appears to be when your fighting an opponent who has played, or been with many experiences with a thief.

The elementalist, it doesn’t matter with his combo, he can knock you out of dodge, knock you back (this counts as a knock down.) and finish you off before you can do anything. (You abilities in a knock down are all qued for 2-3 seconds, you would need a stun breaker to get out of it.)

Meanwhile, for a backstab, you need to find the targets back, if you use your combo too quickly (like I usually do, which is why I don’t play it.) you waste your mug/cloak and dagger/miss the backstab, or hit the target in the front instead of the back.)

It takes more then 0.25 seconds to get behind someone too, it takes about 1.50+ (Pulled this number from my butt, so don’t laugh.) if your very good. (Most thieves try to do there combo when they are behind someone, but really, they don’t see you, and thieves arn’t the fastest class in the game, so its hard to do the combo unless your infront of them, but then you need to get behind them, this is because of the little access of swiftness we have, and steal has a range as well.)

You also have to time your cloak and dagger at the right time and prey it hits your enemy, if your enemy activates a virtue, goes into death shroud, Pops shake it off and starts spinning, you would die instantly.

A lot of times nowadays if I roll full GC backstab thief, I notice a lot more people able to get get out of it by doing several things and just finishing me off. (GC Thieves are the squishiest class in the game, by far.) Most notorious is the “Axe/Axe” and “Greatsword” Warriors, Spin to win! your dead woo!

EasymodeX.4062 knows his stuff, the combo can be done that quickly, but the problem is there is a lot of screw ups that can occur during the combo that just makes it 1-2 seconds instead of 0.25, just because I have to reposition.

The best counter against it, and even I am guilty of this, is using my mouse clicks to turn my toon around very quickly, this pretty much prevents 50% of the damage. (Of course, I’ve been lazy lately, playing a necromancer and just pressing F1 and laughing :P.) If you do do this though, the enemy has to stop and reposition if they are nervous.

Iavra.8510:

A thief must do the same, and explain how you can “stealth away?” Thieves do not have an ability that teleports and stealths them.

Come on…he has all 3 utility skills off CD after executing your combo.

An Elementalist can’t switch to fire attunement and burning speed away?

No, because it never takes him far enough away. And being visible with all utility skills + RtL on CD, he just dies.

This argument isn’t about getting away, its about “BURST.” people don’t care if the thief can get away or not, they don’t want insta-killed.

Exactly, but burst is only half the problems people have with the thief.

Please read the title of the thread.

Iavra.8510:

Lets compare abilities.
Mug: 504 base damage.
Cloak and Dagger: 504
Backstab: 806 (MUST take time to get behind him.)
Lightning Strike: 403 damage. (about a 40% chance to apply to this combo.)

Total damage if everything goes well: 2217
Chance of everything going well: About 40%, Thieves only have a Critical Chance of 60% if they stack it.

Arcane Power: 0 Damage, makes next 5 attacks critical.
Ride the Lightning: 336 Damage.
Updraft: Knocking them down.
Arcane Blast: 470 Damage. (20% base damage for knocking them down.)
Arcane Wave: 470 Damage. (20% base damage for knocking them down.)
Lightning Strike: 403 Damage (20% base damage for knocking them down.)
Lightning Strike: 403 Damage (20% base damage for knocking them down.) (sigil of air.) (about a 80% chance to apply to this combo.)

Total damage if everything goes well: 2432.
Chance of everything working properly: about 95%, You have a Guarenteed chance to critical on all 5 attacks, and sigil of air, because of how many attacks your doing at once, has a very high chance to proc off any attack.

You seem to ignore the fact that the elementalist needs all of his utility skills and his best movement skill to pull this off where the thief still got all 3 utilities and enough initiative to escape.

The ele has to kill with this combo or he is just dead, the thief stealths away.

A thief must do the same, and explain how you can “stealth away?” Thieves do not have an ability that teleports and stealths them.

An Elementalist can’t switch to fire attunement and burning speed away?

This argument isn’t about getting away, its about “BURST.” people don’t care if the thief can get away or not, they don’t want insta-killed.

This is a strawman argument, and i’m afraid with your logic, there is no way I can win.

Mug should just do 35% max health damage, percent based to any mob or player!

Thieves will be wanted in instances!

Backstab should be a combo finisher.

EasymodeX.4062:

Lets compare abilities.
Mug: 504 base damage.
Cloak and Dagger: 504
Backstab: 806 (MUST take time to get behind him.)
Lightning Strike: 403 damage. (about a 40% chance to apply to this combo.)
Total damage if everything goes well: 2217

Bonus 15% on all the attacks. Bonus tick of poison. Three stacks of Vuln. Extra 10 Might [14%].

(504 + 504) * (1 + .6 * 1.1) * 1. * 1.15 * 1.14 + (806 + 403) * (1 + .6 * 1.1) * 1.03 * 1.35 * 1.14

= 5375 avg

Edit: I forgot to throw in the poison. Ohwell.

Arcane Power: 0 Damage, makes next 5 attacks critical.
Ride the Lightning: 336 Damage.
Updraft: Knocking them down.
Arcane Blast: 470 Damage. (20% base damage for knocking them down.)
Arcane Wave: 470 Damage. (20% base damage for knocking them down.)
Lightning Strike: 403 Damage (20% base damage for knocking them down.)
Lightning Strike: 403 Damage (20% base damage for knocking them down.) (sigil of air.) (about a 80% chance to apply to this combo.)
Total damage if everything goes well: 2432.

336
363
628
403
403

(336) * (1 + 1.1) * 1 + (363 + 628 + 403 + 403) * (1 + 1.1) * 1.2

= 5234

Le shocke. Almost as much. I wonder if the autocrit on BS would be better:

(504 + 504) * (1 + .6 * 1.1) * 1 * 1.15 * 1.14 + (403) * (1 + .6 * 1.1) * 1.03 * 1.15 * 1.14 + 806 * (1 + 1.1) * 1.03 * 1.15 * 1.14

= 5357

Not much difference I guess.

Still, not bad all things considered.

Now if RTL didn’t have a travel time and a hugeass obvious animation, combined with the loud sound effect, you’d have a real competitor for CND Mug BS.

Edit:

Although the Norn elite stealth action in the video made me laugh my kitten off.

Eh? Stealth has an animation and a sound effect as well though if you’ve seen it tons of times, since I played it, I can actually notice the shadowstep sound and react subconciously.

Elementalist usually catches me by suprise more, but I don’t play the class.

At least you take the time to do the math though.

You have to give up the 20% Damage under 50% health for that though, its kind of a toss up.

Cirax.9231:

I don’t think updraft counts as knockdown, rather a blowout like the big explosions engies make. I’ve tested this in the mists – earthquake counts but not updraft.

Oh, never played Ele, but I played warrior and blowouts still affect traits that increase damage.

I think hes actually knocking them down with his form.

And if that IS the case, then the backstab/ele combo do about the same damage.

Leadfoot.9071:

Attila.6348:

Daecollo.9578:

Attila.6348:

Daecollo.9578:

Attila.6348:

As a necro with 22k hp, I was hit for 20k damage, by a thief, in matter of 2 seconds. I was left with 2k health, confused as to what just happened, he stealthed and finished me off. Yes, there is something wrong with this. I don’t care how glass cannony you are, if there is no counter to this, it should be nerfed. Or, if nerfs aren’t planned, give my necro an irremovable debuff/condition that does 1k damage per second every time you move until you have stopped and not moved for 3 seconds. That sounds like a perfect thief counter to me.

My necromancer has no problem killing thieves, how much toughness does your necromancer have?

In fact, I don’t think its possible for my necromancer to die to a thief as long as i’m paying attention.

I forgot to mention that I didn’t even see the thief. This wasn’t a duel. This was me running towards an herb I wanted to pick, thief pops out of stealth, pulls Steal, Backstab, and Cloak and Dagger, and by the time my heal skill hits 100%, I’m dead.

Can I see a list of your traits please?
I would also like to know how much toughness you have.

I mean, it seems like you weren’t paying attention either, which isn’t the thieves fault.

Considering I’m a condition/power Necro, my toughness is at 1041. And I always pay attention in WvW, but I was jumped. As in, I didn’t see him in front of me or on the side.

I play a necro as well and think that out of all the classes the necro is really good for countering the thief backstab burst – but you do have to be quick. If you don’t see him coming at all you are at a severe disadvantage – but it’s going to be rare that you are full HP and his combo completely kills you. Ways to counter thief on necro:

1) Dodge – requires you seeing them coming
2) Well of Darkness – requires you seeing them coming
3) Spectral stun break
4) Death shroud – requires you to have LF
5) Some good traits for this too like the one that fears when you are disabled and spectral armor at 50% health

All that said, you still have to be on top of things to survive the thief burst – but each class has their strengths and weaknesses and I think the thief burst is not really so far out of balance in the grand scheme of things.. just my opinion though – I know plenty disagreee.

I play both thief and necro, if my necro isn’t paying attention, he deserves to get killed, but I take traits that makes that combo almost impossible to kill me.

If you played both classes, you would probably see what i’m talking about, Thief is actually underpowered when it comes to most things, as well as necromancer.

If an enemy applies conditions to plague form, plague form should convert them to boons.

EasymodeX.4062:

Yes, but Cloak and Dagger and Mug are 60% critical chance, while his combo is always 100% critical chance, therefore Cloak and Dagger has a chance to hit significantly less then his combo.

Zzzz 15% damage for the next 5 attacks.

As a simple arithmetic exercise: 3113 > 1850.

His combo doesn’t change much, and he retains all that damage easilly.

All the “half a Thief’s damage”, ok.

A thief can get 20% damage under 50% health, but he must sacrifice 100% critical chance while in stealth to get this trait, so therefore his Cloak and Dagger, Mug and Backstab combo all require a CHANCE to critical hit.

Ok and?

You are throwing out a lot of random traits and effects — much like Stiv trying so hard to fabricate potential scenarios where other classes may have almost as much damage in almost as little time (but not really) compared to Thieves.

Are you going to actually put those together into a rational argument to somehow demonstrate that the Ele can output more than half the damage a Thief can in less than twice the timeframe?

Lets compare abilities.
Mug: 504 base damage.
Cloak and Dagger: 504
Backstab: 806 (MUST take time to get behind him.)
Lightning Strike: 403 damage. (about a 40% chance to apply to this combo.)

Total damage if everything goes well: 2217
Chance of everything going well: About 40%, Thieves only have a Critical Chance of 60% if they stack it.

Arcane Power: 0 Damage, makes next 5 attacks critical.
Ride the Lightning: 336 Damage.
Updraft: Knocking them down.
Arcane Blast: 470 Damage. (20% base damage for knocking them down.)
Arcane Wave: 470 Damage. (20% base damage for knocking them down.)
Lightning Strike: 403 Damage (20% base damage for knocking them down.)
Lightning Strike: 403 Damage (20% base damage for knocking them down.) (sigil of air.) (about a 80% chance to apply to this combo.)

Total damage if everything goes well: 2432.
Chance of everything working properly: about 95%, You have a Guarenteed chance to critical on all 5 attacks, and sigil of air, because of how many attacks your doing at once, has a very high chance to proc off any attack.

So Elementalist’s combo actually does more damage then thieves, and it is easier to pull off, because you don’t need to be behind the target to do it.

EasymodeX.4062:

Daecollo.9578:

EasymodeX.4062:

Daecollo.9578:

Eh, you didn’t watch that elementalist video where he was killing people faster then a thief could?

Actually no, because I don’t watch youtube videos at work, usually.

Uh, then can you wait until you put down comments saying they can’t and argue with people about it? it makes your arguments one sided if you don’t even look at the evidence.

So, after taking a look at the video, it appears that the Ele is getting good hits with with LS and RTL, basically a 10k combo whose cast time is basically dependent on how far he is (RTL travel time at 600 units per second).

The base damages for those two abilities are 403 and 336. The base damage for CND, Mug, and BS are 504, 504, and 403 (806), respectively.

So, the Ele basically does significantly less damage than a Thief (note: it’s hard to see, but it seems like he’s getting up to 13k spikes when you add in Sigil of Air and so on, where a Thief would be combo’ing for >20k — should be up to 25k or so — on a similar upleveled glass target), and takes a variable amount of time up to 2.0s to achieve that.

The Thief takes 0.75 total time to achieve more damage. Luckily, the Ele can recast LS pretty quickly.

You’re not really helping your case.

Yes, but Cloak and Dagger and Mug are 60% critical chance, while his combo is always 100% critical chance, therefore Cloak and Dagger has a chance to hit significantly less then his combo.

Your not helping your case.

His utility makes his next 5 hits critical, nomatter what, so he can take Valkyrie gear and be fine, while a thief must give up all his gear for zerkers and rely on chance to finish off an opponent.

he can also take 10 points in Elemental Attunement and get protection for when he goes into earth.

His combo doesn’t change much, and he retains all that damage easilly.

A thief can get 20% damage under 50% health, but he must sacrifice 100% critical chance while in stealth to get this trait, so therefore his Cloak and Dagger, Mug and Backstab combo all require a CHANCE to critical hit.

A thief can do higher damage, but he has to rely on luck to do so, while a elementalist does not.

Attila.6348:

Daecollo.9578:

Attila.6348:

Daecollo.9578:

Attila.6348:

As a necro with 22k hp, I was hit for 20k damage, by a thief, in matter of 2 seconds. I was left with 2k health, confused as to what just happened, he stealthed and finished me off. Yes, there is something wrong with this. I don’t care how glass cannony you are, if there is no counter to this, it should be nerfed. Or, if nerfs aren’t planned, give my necro an irremovable debuff/condition that does 1k damage per second every time you move until you have stopped and not moved for 3 seconds. That sounds like a perfect thief counter to me.

My necromancer has no problem killing thieves, how much toughness does your necromancer have?

In fact, I don’t think its possible for my necromancer to die to a thief as long as i’m paying attention.

I forgot to mention that I didn’t even see the thief. This wasn’t a duel. This was me running towards an herb I wanted to pick, thief pops out of stealth, pulls Steal, Backstab, and Cloak and Dagger, and by the time my heal skill hits 100%, I’m dead.

Can I see a list of your traits please?
I would also like to know how much toughness you have.

I mean, it seems like you weren’t paying attention either, which isn’t the thieves fault.

Considering I’m a condition/power Necro, my toughness is at 1041. And I always pay attention in WvW, but I was jumped. As in, I didn’t see him in front of me or on the side.

You should focus on Condition damage or Power, not both. Your a necromancer, so get some toughness.

My necromancer has 1600 toughness, and an additional 400 when i’m paying attention, and I get 33% damage reduction when my health falls below 50% (when thieves do more damage.) thanks to my spec, I have 0 issues handling thieves damage.

With my staff marks, I can lay them under my feet, so if a thief DOES attack me, he gets immediately hit with 2-3 marks, I also create a mark when I dodge as well, making him eat even more damage, and my marks are unblockable as well.

A thief MUST be in melee range to hurt you significantly, so just lay them under your feet and your pretty much un-killable.

I am more afraid of thieves on my own thief then my necromancer, I pretty much turn thieves into a joke.

EasymodeX.4062:

Daecollo.9578:

Eh, you didn’t watch that elementalist video where he was killing people faster then a thief could?

Actually no, because I don’t watch youtube videos at work, usually.

Uh, then can you wait until you put down comments saying they can’t and argue with people about it? it makes your arguments one sided if you don’t even look at the evidence.

Attila.6348:

Daecollo.9578:

Attila.6348:

As a necro with 22k hp, I was hit for 20k damage, by a thief, in matter of 2 seconds. I was left with 2k health, confused as to what just happened, he stealthed and finished me off. Yes, there is something wrong with this. I don’t care how glass cannony you are, if there is no counter to this, it should be nerfed. Or, if nerfs aren’t planned, give my necro an irremovable debuff/condition that does 1k damage per second every time you move until you have stopped and not moved for 3 seconds. That sounds like a perfect thief counter to me.

My necromancer has no problem killing thieves, how much toughness does your necromancer have?

In fact, I don’t think its possible for my necromancer to die to a thief as long as i’m paying attention.

I forgot to mention that I didn’t even see the thief. This wasn’t a duel. This was me running towards an herb I wanted to pick, thief pops out of stealth, pulls Steal, Backstab, and Cloak and Dagger, and by the time my heal skill hits 100%, I’m dead.

Can I see a list of your traits please?
I would also like to know how much toughness you have.

I mean, it seems like you weren’t paying attention either, which isn’t the thieves fault.

The problem with P D is it only works if your enemy is stupid enough to fight it.

its a very survivable, but slow to kill build, it takes even a long time to kill glass cannon specced players.

Any decent or good player facing a decent or good PD Thief only needs to do one simple thing, Turn around and walk away, a PD Thief cannot catch up to you, nomatter how fast they are, What are they gonna do to stop you?

EasymodeX.4062:

I can’t tell if you don’t really play against good players or what. Any warrior who simply opens up with Frenzy+Bull+100b is a noob. Good ones are extremely hard to deal with and mix it up a lot more. Usually GS + S/Sh or Ax/Sh. Good warrios either count evades or Bullrush as soon as you start an evade (ermergerd takes twitch) which makes it impossible to avoid.

Oh please. You can use any number of effects to still counter that. You can:

1. Steal to another target.
2. Shadow return off Sword2 or the utility.
3. Shadowstep with the utility.
4. Death Lotus or Flanking Strike if it’s an immob / not BR. You could alternatively straight up DL/FS the Bull’s Rush if it’s not Frenzied.
5. Blind the BR.

Pretty sure you can Withdraw/RFI the combo, but not 100% on that.

I’ve actually spent quite a few hours in sPvP on a glass GS Warrior (it’s hilarious to play if nothing else), so I’m fully aware of the timing and how to nail people with BR even when they’re making an effort not to die. Next you’re going to tell me to force a cooldown with Rush. Jfc sit down, son.

In any case, on my Thief I can literally ignore a Warrior for half the kitten fight with random cooldowns.

The difference is that you are reacting to the Warrior. A Thief kills you before pure reaction is possible. Pre-action becomes mandatory, rather than value added.

CND-Mug-BS is basically the only class / attack sequence in the game that fits that profile.

It takes twitch to avoid mesmer pulls (borderline impossible),

Luckily those don’t actually deal >15k damage, and you can use instant abilities out of the knockdown.

hammer hits from both guards and wars.

You are reaching really, really deep.

It takes twitch and positioning to avoid mesmer burst,

Good thing you can see it coming 4-7 seconds in advance.

a teleport+churning earth.

1.5s in advance.

Yes it takes twitch to avoid Thief burst but the difference between all of the above and Thief is all of those examples

Is that you have 0.5s to react to the Thief. You get 1.5-6 seconds to react to all the other nasties in this game.

Not only that, in more dynamic situations such as WvW, you actually have to identify the “add” as a Thief (within 0.25s).

I’ve said it before: there’s not much that needs to be changed. All ANet needs to do is to:

1. Nerf the damage of Mug (I recommend halving the direct damage and adding condition damage to make it more flexible for more builds).
2. Make the CND damage instant rather than delayed, with the stealth taking effect after the cast. E.g. “dagger and cloak”.
3. Increase the cast time of BS by 0.25s [optional].

1. is the more important part. I include #1 because Mug is silly in the current design and it sucks balls in my heavy condition damage builds. #3 combos with #2 if additional time is necessary.

The gist is that the change makes the CND-Mug-BS combo something that is more reasonable to react to if you are, in fact, paying attention and see it coming.

Eh, you didn’t watch that elementalist video where he was killing people faster then a thief could?

Attila.6348:

As a necro with 22k hp, I was hit for 20k damage, by a thief, in matter of 2 seconds. I was left with 2k health, confused as to what just happened, he stealthed and finished me off. Yes, there is something wrong with this. I don’t care how glass cannony you are, if there is no counter to this, it should be nerfed. Or, if nerfs aren’t planned, give my necro an irremovable debuff/condition that does 1k damage per second every time you move until you have stopped and not moved for 3 seconds. That sounds like a perfect thief counter to me.

My necromancer has no problem killing thieves, how much toughness does your necromancer have?

In fact, I don’t think its possible for my necromancer to die to a thief as long as i’m paying attention.

Any plans on adding T vs T vs T?

or T vs T vs T vs T? would be interesting.

Thieves are a scout and distraction class.

Run into there zerg and run away, take half the zerg with you, they all hate thieves.

Nier.2478:

This really isn’t a bad suggestion if you wouldn’t be allowed to use Berserker Power with it. And the effect in which “gain adrenaline when hit” needs to be baseline on the adrenaline mechanic.

Thick skin should simply be +100 toughness when you invest 5 points into Defense.

Yep, agreed, but I don’t like the restrictive trait idea, warrior has so much +10% damage spread around everywhere anyways, it really wouldn’t make a difference if you restricted the trait or not.

I can’t get zerker’s power? Ok I will just put 10 more points here and get the same effect. Lol. (warrior has damage traits all over the place.)

Heres an example:
http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#mcR9wapf0GV9Mz
(This is what I would do if I had the trait.)

Oh? I can’t use berserker’s power.

Then I would just do this:
http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#mcR9ipf0x9Mz

No difference, all it would do is restrict weapon choices even more then they are already restricted too.

EasymodeX.4062:

Daecollo.9578:

This isn’t true, elementalist can also instantly kill people. (even faster then a thief can.)

Sounds cool; post the numbers (max glass on glass).

I know they can combo pretty high, but few run full Berserker so I can’t get a good handle on their maximum.

I will just let the video show you what elementalist can do.

EasymodeX.4062:

What you are talking about is not having situational awareness. You know what direction people will likely be coming from, it’s not hard to have that in the back of your mind while you are fighting/strafing around.

In sPvP, sure. WvW tends to be more dynamic, especially with culling.

Most thieves run a signet, same with all other professions, takes just targeting them for a second to know what they are.

A second is about twice as long as you have before you die.

It really doesn’t matter because any GC build will ruin your day in a 1vN fight so you need to assume that’s what you dealing with until you know for sure.

You can react to glass specs of any class — except a BS Thief.

I personally always turn my attention to Thieves when they show up for two obvious reasons. They are the highest, fastest burst risk and they are the easiest to kill and stomp.

Warriors are infinitely easier to kill and stomp. Thieves are among the more obnoxious classes.

AoE/Cleave will keep a GC thief downed and cripple their rezer at the same time.

That sounds a lot different from, say, all the other classes in the game.

If you are any good at FPS games

I’m relatively proficient at FPS games.

you should have no problem avoiding this, there is no need to dumb down GW2 for you and others like you for the same reason they will never remove head-shot damage from Counter Strike. The game requires twitch, sorry.

The only real mechanic that “requires twitch” in this entire game is to pre-emptively counter 1 build from 1 class.

I suppose the lesson here is that all players should roll Thieves. Sounds like balance to me.

This isn’t true, elementalist can also instantly kill people. (even faster then a thief can.)

stof.9341:

Daecollo.9578:

Reduce Backstab damage by 35%, front damage improved by 35%.

Funny, with your changes, a back placed Backstab will only do a tiny more damage than C&D. As this point the thief would be better of casting C&D so that it lands after stealth ends rather than face the revealed debuff.

Let’s not even talk about the Initiative regen nerf.

Well, did you read the entire thing? Lol.

Currently it is: Gain Adrenaline when hit.

This would be a very nice AA, except in PvP and most PvE situations, if you get hit too much or focused enough to make this trait actually be what it was for, you usually die.

Increases damage reduction based on how much adrenaline you have built:
Stage 1: 3%
Stage 2: 7%
Stage 3: 12%

This would allow the Warrior to have a tanking trait they would want to sacrifice damage for, and give the Warrior some protection they desperately need when they are focused on in SPVP and Instances.

for “Thick Skin” change it to over 50% health. (and all other traits similar to this one for other classes.)

+30% Critical Damage for 10 seconds.
+60% Damage Taken for 10 seconds.

Nerfs:
Reduce Mug damage by 50%.
Reduce Backstab damage by 35%, front damage improved by 35%.
Heart-seeker increased to 4 initiative from 3, its damage has been reduced by 15%.
Combined Training has been removed.
Combo Critical Chance has been removed.
Sundering Strikes has been removed.

Buffs:
Initiative Recharges at 1.0 per second instead of 1.6.
Steal cooldown has been reduced from 45 to 25.
Double Strike, Wild Strike, Lotus Strike has had a small base damage increase.
Shadowed Protector now grants Protection instead of Regeneration.
Expeditious Dodger now grants Vigor instead of Swiftness.
Opportunist no longer has an internal cooldown.
Keen Observer now grants critical chance over 50% Health instead of 90%.
Assassin’s Retreat now additionally gives Stability.
Last Refuge now removes and ignores “revealed” when it triggers.
Hidden Thief now removes and ignores “revealed” when it triggers.
Instinctual Response now removes and ignores “revealed” when it triggers.
Blinding Tuft (Stolen skill.) now removes and ignores “revealed” when it triggers.
Throw Feathers (Stolen skill.) now removes and ignores “revealed” when it triggers.
Deadly Arts [X] Fierce Brigand: Sword and Spear damage is increased by 10%.
Critical Strikes [IX] Swashbuckler: Increases your critical-hit chance with a Sword and Pistol by 10%.
Deadly Arts [VI] Weakening Strikes: Whenever you apply Weakness to a foe, you also steal 15 endurance from them.

This would improve the class over all.

Blacksarevok.8104:

What I expect:
- 15% Backstab nerf, buff to #1 chain to compensate
- Clusterbomb nerf
- Mug nerf, or it being swapped to a higher tier

What I want:
- 15% buff to Pistol Whip in PVE only
- 15% buff to Vital Shot
- Black Powder becomes a ground-target AoE with 900 range, making it more useful for P/P without nerfing it for D/P or S/P.
- Body Shot vulnerability increased to 8 seconds baseline and damage increased so it’s not as big of a personal DPS loss to use it.
- Shadow Shot root removed (please do this ANET)
- Flanking Strike animation sped up or instantly teleports you behind the target, provides a block charge to make up for the loss of evasion.

What I expect:
Huge Damage Nerfs.

What I want:
Not to be Nerfed and to actually have useful boons.

fony.5102:

fellow warriors, post if you agree. right now the skill is pretty pointless for us. very, very redundant. my proposal is this:

- effect = Gain Fury, Retaliation and +20% critical damage
- duration = 10 seconds
- cooldown = 30 seconds

yay? nay?

Berserker’s Stance.
12 seconds of retaliation.
20 seconds of 5 stacks of Might.