Guild Wars 2

There was a recipe that can randomly get you Silver Doubloons but this would be nice. I think the recipe I found was, any four of some of the lower level jewels. And as stated the results were random.

This won’t help small groups defeat zergs, it’ll just strengthen zergs against each other. And you won’t break up the zerging with this because let’s face it, no one is going to 5 man Stonemist or any of the larger towers. If anything this’ll just make keeps and tower impossible to take when defended.
I know the common thought about zergs among small groups is, they’re just a bunch of mindless bads, but the fact of the matter is zergs are becoming smarter as commanders gain more experience. New tactics are forming, things like; only the commanders can place siege, commanders communicating with each other via various means, might stacking, building for survival instead of damage, staying as tight on you commander as possible. They aren’t so mindless anymore, and a zerg run by a seasoned commander is way more useful then a 5 man gank squad.

Ves.8236:

If they will make those armors available only for gems (so, cash) i will quit this game. I want to have access to whole game, and have oportunity to get all items by playing, not by spending my money on them.

You can get Gems for Gold and Gold for Gems as stated above. At least it’s better then these RNG weapon boxes, and grinding for golds isn’t all that different from grinding for forge recipe mats.

Now I want cupcakes.

What if they made is so weapon skills had a different kind stealth from utility stealths.? For clarity’s sake I’ll call this second stealth “shroud”. Shroud would be exactly the same as stealth but would render the user transparent rather them invisible and be exclusive Cloak and Dagger and Smoke Leap. Shroud would proc the same traits as stealth. Perhaps if it proves too weak they could give it something like 70% chance that all incoming hits will be glancing.
With this in place Anet could have an easier job buffing us in our real trouble areas. Do things like swap Last Refuge with Clocked in Shadow; buff the way our Regen scales; increase the area at which backstab and tactical strike count as a back attack, allow us to hold a point while Shrouded ect.

Not letting this one die.

We really need them to make a new method of protecting control without out right rendering it pointless. I had a thought. What if they weakened the Unshakeable’s resistance to blind to say, 30% (may not sound like much but classes with a lot of blinds) or did something like make it so blinds will result in Glances rather then Misses with unshakable. Along with the other stated changes in the vid.

Straegen.2938:

Is this really an issue worth addressing? I get why people want limited balance in WvW and good balance in sPvP, but PvE is you versus the game. We really shouldn’t care if one class has an easy button over another especially since wins are shared. PvE isn’t a competition. If a player wants to coast through it, pick a warrior. If they want more of a challenge, look at other classes. All classes can enjoy the content so what is the big whup?

The problem is, the dungeon community is getting to the point that they’ll only allow meta builds into parties. Or at least that’s the perception. All classes can play but no one wants a Ranger or Thief when a Warrior is available. I’m with Kaaboose on this one. Anet needs to fix encounters so Support and Control have a place in combat.

Raven.9603:

i really dont have a problem with perma stealth. the only problem with stealth in GW2 is that they ignored one thing every other game got right:

limited in-combat vanishes.

with cloak n dagger or bp+hs, thieves can stealth as often as we want. so we do. stealth, backstab. stealth, backstab. now youre low, maybe get lazy and heartseeker.

from the interviews on SOTG, Anet comes off as claiming that this makes the class a conundrum that is hard to balance (we cant make them tough because of infinite vanishes, but we cant take away their vanishes because theyre not tough).

in reality, if they only had 1 or 2 in combat vanishes, they could be balanced around being exposed more often. maybe higher base HP, better avoidance mechanics, something.

limiting the amount of re-stealths limits the amount of hugely powerful openers, which makes gameplay more involving for the thief (do i use my vanish for a second huge backstab or do i save it to escape), plus combat will last longer in general. it also limits escape potential, which makes it more rewarding to engage thieves.

the current state of not being able to kill any thief who doesnt want to be killed, not even remotely acceptable.

Problem being they’ve gone and tied both the defensive and the offensive options to stealth. S/D loses it’s control specialization without stealth, D/x loses it’s burst and P/D loses it’s conditions. Out of all the stealth sets only wouldn’t be completely wrecked would be D/D, retaining it’s condition options.

This gives me an idea though. What if they made 2 kinds of stealth, utilities having the traditional stealth and weapons having a semi visible stealth. And balancing as such like for instance swapping Last Refuge for Cloaked in Shadow?

eldain stenlund.4306:

you have 1200 toughness

less then 2500 armor..

that is why you’re getting hit hard.

Don’t get me wrong, berserker thieves are going to hit you hard…But you’re getting crushed because you’re glass cannon just the same.

You need to get off the notion that just because you’re in heavy armor..It means you’re impossible to kill

If you get tanky, you still die. just takes 4 seconds instead of 2.
But you cant do crap against thief either in tank… so your just becoming a free kill.

Heavy armor should have naturaly High physical resist.
Have you ever tried to use a knife against a plate armor ?? i have, just for the fun of it.
And trust me.. i didnt even dent the kitten crap when i stabbed it or slized at it.

Heavy armor… is the totaly Anti knife armor. hell its even anti sword to some degree.

If you want a similar test.. just take a 2 mm thick metal sheet… then take a knife.. and stabb away all you like.. you never gonna hurt the metal.

1200 Toughness is disgustingly low. You really shouldn’t take your CoF gear into WvW. Sets like Soldier’s is the meta there.

And for the whole armour thing, Sure you have plate mail, but it still has joints. In medieval combat, would carry small knives on the side so they could shove them through the enemy’s armour joints.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rondel_dagger#Usage

Here’s the thing. No one likes being kicked from a party. Period. So when you kick someone, no matter how you try to sugar coat of justify it, they aren’t going to like it and they will see you as an elitist jerk.
How you act outside this speed run doesn’t matter, right now you’ve kicked someone who got their hopes up of finding a group.
Elitism and looking for maximum efficiency go hand in hand, because if you want maximum efficiency, you want the best party you can get; and the line where you cross into elitism is when you disallow others into the run because they don’t meet your view of “efficient”.
In any case, farming CoF shouldn’t be a thing. It just gives players who do it more gold, which in turn decreases the value of gold, driving up the prices in the TP, so players will need more gold and run more CoF runs, in one big vicious cycle that: 1) doesn’t satisfy the CoF farmer because they continually rising cost, and 2) Renders the TP inaccessible to the common players. In short, gold farming causes inflation.

Killkill.7983:

AlietteFaye.7316:

Player Character.9467:

tigirius.9014:

Player Character.9467:

DPS thieves and elementalists can easily take a spot or 2 without lowering the party dps at all. Go look at DPS ele builds and DPS thief w/Sbow + warrior Lbow F1. Also three warriors brings 9 might, you might want to check your math on 3×3 again.

Warriors having the highest survivability… that’s a joke right? Ignoring the fact that necros have the highest health pool in the game, have you seen what you can do with rangers, guardians, and d/d eles? Warriors do have low survivability compared to the other classes, you’re getting caught up on hp and armor values which mean nothing in a sustained fight.

It’s no joke in PVE. It’s not just the health pool in PVE armor class actually matters. The better the armor the better the defense.

I do believe you are mixing PVP and PVE because in PVE they run thru everything like a truck. That’s not normal or typical of how the other classes play.

Protection – 33% damage reduction, not available in a warrior’s skill set.
Chill – Skill cooldowns increased 66%, not available in a warrior’s skill set.
Blind – Next attack misses, only 1 skill in a warrior’s set, on the longbow.
POOF armor difference more than gone.

And that’s not even considering comparisons with how other classes can handle conditions (which ignore armor) or their relative healing capabilities at the same healing power or their comparable invuln/blocks.

Protection, I’ll give you.

The other two don’t matter in PvE.

Making an attack (including massive 1-shot KO boss attacks) not do anything or slowing down enemies massively so they can be easily controlled and dealt with doesn’t matter in PvE?
:/
I say no nerfs to anything,rather it would be better to buff some of the weaker classes for PvE,so that warriors aren’t the be-all-end-all for PvE and so other classes can be used without gimping the damage output of the group.
It would be nice to have necros or engis fulfill the massive damage role in a group,but in their current state they can’t do that as effectively and when they can do that they have less survivability anyways.

Except, blinds are only 10% effective on bosses.

TheOneNOnlyGeneralBama.9586:

Black Teagan.9215:

The Game Slayer.7632:

let me add my two cents in. THIEVES CAN HEAL FOR 500 HEALTH PER SECOND VERY SECOND THEY ARE IN STEALTH. More healing than an average ele. And they can do this utilizing only two traits.

And?

Guardians can heal more than 300 points every sec, without any requirements, and this also on 4 persons if they will.
And btw, thiefs have no skills to block or negate every dmg.

Uhm blind fields and evasions come to mind…lots and lots of them both lol

They have one projectile block, blind fields are small and short lived, one reflect which is an elite, and stealth set evades last less then a second. They can’t even begin the compare to AoE heals, Blocks, aoe cleanses, and other defense Eles and Guardian can dish out. It’s like comparing a squirt gun to a fire hose.

D/P is all around better unless you want to go Condition. It’s only draw back is it’s a lot more heavy on initiative.
D/D has options if you want a condition build, and can do just as well on a direct damage build, but it has less defense and requires a target to stealth off of.

And yet their healing isn’t nearly as good as other classes’, even when specced for it. In any case, the spammable heals require the thief to be in combat.

It’d be nice if the Dragons actually moved around as opposed to just standing there. Something like this maybe.

But with way more moves and such.

Fenrir.5493:

Dual.8953:

Fenrir.5493:

randomfightfan.4091:

Fenrir.5493:

LIES.

Thieves is the most broken class, they rely on their cheap stealth + backtab to do something,, they can perma stealth and they can be loosing the battle but oh wait, he just restarted the battle again,, and oh com on! he can inmovilise me while he is doing me his backstab, talking about cheap mechanics….

Well obviously you’ve never played a thief b/c you’re just mindlessly complaining for the sake of complaining while also spouting false information. Also exactly what part of what I said was a lie? The question I asked or me saying people complain about thief because they can go invisible? Lastly l2grammar.

Your post really reminded me of this video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OaklcXNjdks

They were lies, and its not false information actually i have a thief so i really know how the things work, you just need to catch someone off guard while you are in stealth and VOILA backstab him with the stone poison keep attacking with your autoattack, if he is not dead yet, spam heart seeker, then profit.

The other player has 0 defenses to that, and if for some stupid reason you fail that cheap abuse of backstab then you can simply re stealth and try again with all your stealth utilities and skills, you can escape and restore your health to full if you are in trouble, and then try again your cheap backstab spam.

Here’s your defenses:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Stun_breaker
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Dodge
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Aegis
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Protection
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Vigor
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Healing
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Toughness
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Block
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Blind
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Evade
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Distortion_%28effect%29
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Invulnerability
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Regeneration
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Fear

I think people have options.

So, you need to be a fortune teller or able to see the future in order to prevent someone from one shot you from stealth…. seems reasonable.

No. You need logic.
Anything X/D will need to land CnD to stealth so kite the user and they’ll either have to use a utility to stealth, and those are on 30+ cooldowns. Hide in Shadow and Blinding Powder last 3 seconds, as with CnD and CnD can’t be used before the stealth ends naturally. In other words. Make yourself hard to hit for 3 seconds.
As for Shadow Refuge, it can last up to 12 second but it’s pretty obvious when it’s used. It also is one of the most counterable stealths because it confines the user to a small space and if they leave or are forced out via knockback the user will be stuck with Revealed.
D/P is probably thief’s strongest set, despite being very initiative hungry. It can stack stealth via leap finisher into its smoke field, however if its Heartseeker hits something it’ll instantly lose that stealth when stacking so a lot more difficult to stack while engaged. Though stackable, each individual leap is worth 3 seconds.

On to Backstab. Backstab has an 806 damage rating. Half the strength of 100blades in one shot and it’s users commonly use a trait to ensure the skill will always crit. However the skill is short range and it’s damage is halved if it strikes the front of the target. Unless it’s the initial strike, the thief will have 3 seconds to land it, which can be diffcult if the target takes preventative measures. In a fight, when a D/x thief stealths, 9/10 times they are going to try to get behind you. A warning sign for an initial strike backstab is Basilisk Venom. If you’re toon turns grey, that’s your cue to pop a stunbreak. If performed correctly the thief will have blown his opening strike and attack buff utilities they had used in preparation. In addition, it’s rare that a backstab or even a backstab combo can one shot a player, and it’s impossible against players that aren’t going glass cannon.

The long and short of it is, most stealths last 3 seconds, backstab only hits high from behind, and you should be ready to react in WvW at anytime, not just because or thieves, but because anything can come over the hill and gank you.

Also a pro tip. Run an armour set with Toughness in it. Gear like Knight’s and Soldier’s will make you so much more useful to your server then Berserker’s.

You remind me of someone named Columba.

Fenrir.5493:

randomfightfan.4091:

Fenrir.5493:

LIES.

Thieves is the most broken class, they rely on their cheap stealth + backtab to do something,, they can perma stealth and they can be loosing the battle but oh wait, he just restarted the battle again,, and oh com on! he can inmovilise me while he is doing me his backstab, talking about cheap mechanics….

Well obviously you’ve never played a thief b/c you’re just mindlessly complaining for the sake of complaining while also spouting false information. Also exactly what part of what I said was a lie? The question I asked or me saying people complain about thief because they can go invisible? Lastly l2grammar.

Your post really reminded me of this video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OaklcXNjdks

They were lies, and its not false information actually i have a thief so i really know how the things work, you just need to catch someone off guard while you are in stealth and VOILA backstab him with the stone poison keep attacking with your autoattack, if he is not dead yet, spam heart seeker, then profit.

The other player has 0 defenses to that, and if for some stupid reason you fail that cheap abuse of backstab then you can simply re stealth and try again with all your stealth utilities and skills, you can escape and restore your health to full if you are in trouble, and then try again your cheap backstab spam.

Here’s your defenses:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Stun_breaker
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Dodge
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Aegis
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Protection
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Vigor
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Healing
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Toughness
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Block
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Blind
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Evade
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Distortion_%28effect%29
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Invulnerability
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Regeneration
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Fear

I think people have options.

negerleif.2106:

JubeiTM.5763:

Daecollo.9578:

What are thieves going to get for compensation to this nerf?

Thief:
1) Pepperspray: Makes pets unable to attack, run away in fear for 20 seconds. If its cured they immediately are stunned for 10 seconds.
2) Shadow Shield: Makes the Thief to be immune to all guardian attacks/abilities for 10 seconds.
3) Causes the thief to be able to booby trap turrets and gadgets so they explode on the engineer, knocking him back and causing massive damage, this also strips stability.

You are right, thief is the worst class in game! They must be improved! Thief also should get perma cloak and for the love of god tipple the damage. Thief’s should also use heavy armor because a Ninja is strong and all. Swiftness should be special on thief , running 5 times faster. Maybe flying would be nice! And automatically recycle the attacker’s items and deposit them to my collectibles and steal the legendary equipments and make them unbound so I can sell them on trading post.

i think i love you Jubei xD

I play thief myself and i really have to say the stealth needs alot of fixin tweaking nerfing and balancing.

and the “Cloak And Dagger” needs a “detected” condition after every use not only if you attack out of stealth. HUGE problem!
so before you start hating me now, nerfing will also bring balancing to the thief class. it wont get weaker it will just be nerfed then balanced along with it.

Only if this “balancing” includes abilities that make players consider thieves contributing team members, retaining the ability to take out targets behind the enemy line (it’s been Thief and Assassin’s job since day one), make it so we don’t need to go glass to be effective, and since we’re talking about giving classes detection skills, the ability to contest point in stealth.

Jamais vu.5284:

I agree that our burst needs to be reduced. The stealth and especially movement however I deem completely fine in their current incarnation. If you take both and juxtapose them, a class that has stealth/movement but not excessive burst damage seems much healthier than one that has excessive burst damage but not the current survival mechanisms of thief (i.e. a pure glass cannon).
And if you remove both … well, you won’t have thief anymore.

Dual.8953:

In PvE, they’re that damage class with less dps and support then warrior.

If we take your unverified claim at face value for argument’s sake, that still makes it the second best DPS class, and in a meta where DPS rules supreme that’s not half bad.
Support =! spamming boons. Show me where a warrior can absorb projectiles, give party-wide venoms, constantly blind, remove boons, or reliably revive people without firing an elite.

In Spvp, they’re that dueling class that can’t hold a point.

They can hold a point excellently. You don’t have to be a bunker to prevent your enemy from capping a point.

All in all the words of a player who has not much experience with thief.

Allow me to amend that. In PvE, thieves are considered a step above Ranger in Dungeons. Show me a party that will kick a warrior because a thief wants to join. Or a party that cares about venoms, blinds, boon removal and safe revives.

In Spvp, a thief who’s holding a point can’t stealth, and aside from smoke wall and daggerstorm, they have little to defend themselves when being kited. Thieves are slotted exclusively into the Roamer Role.

Torqky.3682:

Large scale zerg fights 30+ against skilled guild zergs not pugs:
1. Guardian
2. Necro
3. Ele
4. Warrior
5. Mesmer
6. Thief
7. Engi
8. Ranger

All about that sustain, stability, AOE pressure(You want retal friendly aoe not small hits).

I think you’re selling Engie short. They can dish out Bleeding, Burning and Poison to large groups of play in multiple ways with little effort and can be every bit as hardy as classes you put near the top at the same time. Certainly better then Thieves, on overall damage, pressure and survivability.

I’d go

A:
Guardian
Elementalist
B:
Mesmer
Warrior
Engineer
Necromancer
Ranger
C:
Thief

dunnberry.2964:

It doesn’t take significant skill to stealth than press 2222222 with maybe another stealth, you have to be decent for that and that’s it, most really skilled thieves I’ve seen actually use anything besides d/d mainly p/p…but regardless thieves are annoying especially when theirs 2 of them

Sorry, I gotta point this out, heartseeker out of stealth is wasteful, really wasteful. After the cost of CnD, you’d 3 maybe 4 Heartseekers, then be out of initative and be unable to use CnD for about 3 or 4 seconds. On top of that, it wouldn’t do much damage at all.

Bodhisattva.6578:

On our server we now have thief groups. So, you have zergs lead by a hammer train which feature a few Ele’s for their combo fields and Mesmers for their utilities, but no real role for the other classes.

I feel WvW can be balanced out by giving Rangers, Necros and Engis anti-stealth skills. Rangers should have a trap, Engis can have a turret and Necros a Mark that has an anti-stealth mechanic and WvW as a whole will be much more balanced. …and don’t tell me they should buy traps, because that will not balance WvW classwise.

Dunno if Engies need it. I’ve Thief v Engie’d from both sides and I always feel the battle’s more in the Engie’s favour. Engies are loaded to the teeth with Conditions (And are capable of maintaining 2-3 different dots at all times), CC, Defenses and Recoveries, and other utilities. Battles usually end with the Thief running off, having barely ruffled the Engie’s feathers.

10/30/0/30/0 Rabid HGH P/S Engie here. Give Engie another hard look. They can find ways to thrive in a wide variety of ways.

mzt.3270:

CreativeAnarchy.6324:

mzt.3270:

CreativeAnarchy.6324:

Thieves are fine.

To other thieves yes

To anyone that has aquired the knowledge in their class and abilities in handling a thief.

I figured out how to deal with them with my particular build. If I can, so can others. It doesn’t take that much to be able to learn how to deal with them, just a little bit of effort.

If you don’t want to learn how, you deserve everything the thief does to you.

Maybe if you would be so kind as to place a good solid explanation and tactics to take thieves down for both melee and ranged classes. I look forward to your findings.

In all honesty, is there a textbook method to kill any class?

It’s annoying. Thieves are weak at everything but minor feats in wvw like killing dolyaks, and weakened opponents. They’re practically more newbie check then they an actual class. In PvE, they’re that damage class with less dps and support then warrior. In Spvp, they’re that dueling class that can’t hold a point. Yet that doesn’t stop people from demanding that they get nerfed at the one thing they’re good at.

mzt.3270:

Rising Dusk.2408:

Yeah ANet, we’re broke, fix us! P/P is really bad and could use some buffs for one, and there are a few other things I can think of offhand, but, oh, I’m sure you read the Thief forums.

Roll an engie and you will see EXACTLY what others are meaning about thieves. I highly recommend you do and you will see thieves actually get a lot more then you think. Let us know how you get on

You’re kidding right? P/P thieves have got nothing on my P/S Engie. Coated Bullets and Incidiary Powder on an HGH build is far far more devastating then anything a ranged thief can muster. That goes for most other sets too.

Helcor.9527:

DanH.5879:

Hi guys,
how we may stop this general hate towards our class
and the QQ drama that is always present in our forums?

any ideeas? (i saw the thief nerfing streak stopped since 2 patches ago so this is good news i guess)

Maybe that should tell you, all other thief fans and the devs something….

I have never seen more thieves in WVW. And thats a lot of thieves.

There’s more of everything. People want their World XP Chests. Thieves just tend to stand out because of their tendancy to solo.

vinceftw.5086:

I think I agree with you (never played GW1) but wouldn’t it be cool to mix up the two styles together? At this point of the game I think stealth is overpowered in WvW (only there). Not when entering combat but when escaping. When a thief stealths up mid fight you never know where he is. He might be on your back or he used that time to ran away and is already almost OOC. That to me is a bit too strong. What I’d propose is a mix of shadowsteps and stealth. With a longer revealed built in but more access to other evasive moves like shadowsteps. And have it better built in than S/D. I don’t like that set very much and basically gets abused for 3 anyway.

Yeah. Not knowing where the thief is, is the idea. It’s basically supposed to be like is they slowed down shadowstep to increase it’s reliability. It’s pretty much, Shadowstep was too fast to be able to control in a hectic situation, so since they couldn’t slow down the battle to make everything easier to target, they slowed down the shadowstep to a speed that it could be controlled accurately. It’s two routes to the same end, breaching the enemy line to reach your desired target, uncontested. One way is instantaneous but difficult to use precisely to set up bursts, and the other is slow and ideal to set up bursts. (They made stealth drop when the user deals damage, because if they made stealth skills destealth you at the start of the channel, it’d be next to impossible to land a stealth skill effectively, the target would be too likely to dodge. The same reason why Infiltrator’s Strike has an immobilize)

sorrow.2364:

How stupid thief forum frequenters are?

Please, tell me another profession which has a stunbreaker on no cooldown (Shadow Return). Tell me another profession which has the same access to no-casting-time teleports which save your kitten when you are under CC. Tell me another profession with the same access to stealth (you cannot be CCed when in stealth unless the CC is AoE and nobody wastes an AoE CC if they aren’t entirely sure they will hit the target).

Seriously guys, you need to play other professions or you need to learn to play your profession. When I’m on my thief, I feel like it’s easy mode against CC.

I’m usually able to escape most situations too, that said, I’m way more of a beast on my HGH Engie than any thief I’ve ever seen.

Burnfall.9573:

It is not called “Hate” it’s called Resentment.

Thief Resentment in General.

Favoritism of Thief class is the cause of Resentment.

Arena net; the Parent of the classes, is Responsible of Playing Favorites.

And Yes!

It will never go away until Arena net avoid playing Favorites.

To Acknowledge, Accept, and Treat every class as Unique.

Favourite my backside. Thieves are only good for roaming in world v world and world completion and pretty much suck at everything else. You want favourite, get a load of Guardians. They’re good in pretty much all situations.

Guardians are requested for parties in all modes, unlike thieves who are almost ever requested for anything.

This is to all you who argue, “nerf stealth and give us more shadowstep”.

First, let’s not kid ourselves, Thief is the spiritual successor to Guild Wars Factions’ Assassin class. They have similar skills, mechanics weapons, and trait lines. Sin’s role was to target key members of the enemy party and burst them down with a combo chain, and the achieved this not by charging through the enemy line like some warrior, but rather, suddenly appearing at their target’s location, completely bypassing the dps and tanks. This was achieved with shadowsteps.
Now as you should be aware, combat in Guild Wars 2 is completely different from the original game. In the first game combat was very slow is terms of mobility, it was easy to pick you targets from a birds eye view and asside from getting out of an AoE, there was very little reason to move in combat. This mode of combat worked wonderfully for shadowsteps because it was so easy to pick you mostly static target.
Now in Guild Wars 2, combat is a completely different beast in terms of mobility. Combatants are constantly on the move with leaps, dodges, speed boosts and just plain running, in large scale fights like Zerg vs Zerg it’s incredibly difficult to single out a specific target. Because of this, shadowsteps are no longer up to the task of breaking the enemy line to set up key targets, you’re just as likely shadowstep to the wrong target as you are to your intended target, and the instant you appear, your target can react and render your burst useless.
Anet needed a new way to get to your target, something more versatilr that would allow the user to react to the rapidly changing state of combat, and still achieve the result of appearing suddenly while your opponent was off guard.
So they gave Thieves stealth. Stealth allowed thieves to get into position to burst thier targets down just as easily as shadowstep used to, while adapting to the ever changing pace of combat, thus allowing them to operate in big and small fights like in gw1, rather then confining them to small fights like shadowsteps would have.

In shor,t what I’m saying is shadowsteps prove too fast to be able to properly control in large scale PvP in Guild Wars 2, and usually can’t be used to target back row opponents like it used to, so since Anet couldn’t slow down battles to make shadowsteps as viable as they used to be, they slowed down Shadowstep and the result was an in-transit state called stealth.

Sorry, but as Player Character said, you don’t need to achieve The Winner’s Circle to get the back piece. You only need 10 of the 15 achievements, and a good amount are pretty much gimme’s. Especially when the story content finally rolls around.

redgabber.5209:

@Kaaboose : my MF solution solve the Trinity/Teamplay issue by adding more realistic roles.

@Dual : control and support is useless because the game is too easy.
With less stat on stuff (replaced by MF), game is harder…so you need to be carefull how you play and respect roles.

Um no. Control is useless because bosses are 90% immune to control effects.

It’s pretty much an arena shooter. Skill manifests itself in players learning the arena and all its facets.

What’s the respawn rate on them? I think it’s faster running small farming parties hitting all in the area

Eh. At least the much cooler Shatterer wings are much easier to get. Just complete 10 achievements

redgabber.5209:

hi, just have look to my thread :

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/suggestions/Fix-MF-gives-teamplay-rebirth-read-that/first#post2197006

i explain how to fix the teamplay by fixing the MF issue.

This is a serious and easy solution to implement

Doesn’t really do much for the whole control is useless and support is underwhelming problem.

I’m liking my Rabid. If not that, Apothocary for a little more support.

If you want thieves like that. WoW is a thing, that exists.

Fenrir.5493:

Shemsu.8721:

Fenrir.5493:

This is not the way to solve the problem, to solve this problem there are things that are needed:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

And this will balance the things, and now the thieves are fixed.

You do realize that warriors axe autoattack does MORE damage than backstab right?? Every class has a number of skills that do more damage than thieves, doesnt require stealth, doesnt require position behind enemy. You need to be more informed how things work before making suggestions as silly as this

False, i have a thief and a warrior, and axe auto attack its not even close to what you can burst with a single skill in 1 second.

Axe auto attack its divided in 3 attacks and even if you add the damage together the damage its not even close to a 1 backstab, that is why the thives can One hit KO someone from stealth and its not balanced.

You can achieve even more damage with dagger auto attack than with axe autoattack.
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I will add to this:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

-Stealth duration its increased 60%, so thieves have more chance of run or to do something else while in stealth.

Triple Chop has a higher damage rating then Backstab.
Backstab is 806 and Triplechop is 858.

Also, Dagger mainhand’s total auto attack has a lower damage rating then Triple Chop, so what the heck are talking about?

Wow. Haven’t seen a rant post of this caliber in a while. And completely entrenched in his perception, unwilling to explore different perspectives to boot.
I’m just gonna say you’re wrong. You don’t see thieves dominating anything but solo roaming in WvW, and even then, there’s plenty of players that can handle them, especially with survivability becoming the Meta of WvW. Thieves are considered on the low end in PvE, Dungeons, Sieges and TPvP.

Rezzet.3614:

heres the simple fix the Stealth mechanic needs it should be made so that it blurrs thiefs a bit they remains somewhat visible but Untargetable by direct target skills .

Except that makes stealth useless in close quarters. GS Warriors could just mow thieves down if they try to go toe to toe.

Mimir.4690:

Dual.8953:

They could have it so you can swap specs for 5-10 silver if you do it without a trainer. Like maybe 5 in PvE and 10 in WvW. Scaling depending on player level, and maybe decrease the price at the trainer.

Are you suggesting that it should be more expensive to swap traits through the builds? For frugal players, this would make build swapping relatively mute because they would still have to take the time to travel to find a trainer. On the other hand, I think a trainer should cost more money (although the whole money sink is a frustrating one to begin with) because you are basically paying their salaries (if you look at the game economy that way).

No, I’m saying it should cost more to swap on the fly. Like in the middle of dungeons, or running around in the open world.

They could have it so you can swap specs for 5-10 silver if you do it without a trainer. Like maybe 5 in PvE and 10 in WvW. Scaling depending on player level, and maybe decrease the price at the trainer.

You’d need a new name. Druids are already a race in GW2 Lore closely tied to Maguuma and the Sylvari.

stale.9785:

I wvwvw on a guardian – the standard Ah build, knights gear. I have been downed fast enough that there’s no time to pop a shout – that is, no time to press 1 key, by thief burst. This implies the damage is ~16k after allowing for my armour. So we have enormous damage out of nowhere (invisibility is bad) that all procs pretty near instantly. (I will admit, this was against DH, who regularly use speed hacks and flight hacks – it’s not unthinkable that there’s some kind of damage hack out there too.)

You also ignored a key word in point 1. Replace. As in, stealth-b-gone, and let them have to step to a target. Being smacked by someone who you didn’t even know was there for your whole health pool is wrong.

Not viable. Combat is too fast and hectic to be able to methodically target key opponents with shadowstep within a zerg v zerg. Not to mention there’s not enough information on the screen to identify who’s a killable target, especially since every class can run tanky. Stealth achieves shadowstep’s ends, but allows the user to be adaptable in high pressure situations.

And hack or no hack. If 16k was achieved against Knight’s, it’s not normal, even by backstab’s standards.

1) They already have Sin’s Shadowstep
2) No, that totally screw’s over non-burst builds that have stealth at the core of their rotation (ie, and stealth set that isn’t dagger main-hand)
3)The full burst takes more then a second, and I’ve never seen 16k. mostly around 6k-9k. You’d have to be against an exceptionally glassy target to deal that much.
4) Except that stealth offer zero bonuses to defense. It’s purely an illusion. If the illusion doesn’t work then it’s just a stance that lets you do stealth attacks and thieves are rendered as glassy as month one eles. (for those that don’t know, that’s else when didn’t know they were tanky)

As for the PvE thing. Thieves will never be anything but underpowered in PvE as long as champions are resistant to blinds. They’ve already got plenty of blinds. And “a bigger health pool and better sustained damage at the cost of spike damage.”? You know what that’d make thieves? Weak Warriors with blinks.

Atherakhia.4086:

Hype.8032:

I can tell you’ve thought about this but I can’t agree that making the thief more like the other professions is the right move. Does protection fit with an agile low health high damage class? I don’t think it does and neither does Anet judging by how they built it.

Perfect balance isn’t what we want.. slight imbalances keep the meta changing and keep it fun to play. I love stealth but I would accept changes to the class if they continue to lessen its viability. However, adding stability and protection sure as hell isn’t the right way to do it.

Protection is a damage debuff and while it could represent thicker armor, why can’t it also represent that the thief has the upperhand in combat and has his opponent offbalance so his swings aren’t as fast or strong.

Aegis could reflect a person raising their shield or large weapon to guard against an attack, but why can’t it also represent the thief riposting an attack to create an opening?

But yea, simply giving the class ranger level health would be sufficient (they have about 4k more hp) for the longevity aspect of the class to bring sustained damage to bear. Still need to resolve the lack of burst issue (for example, introduce a third strike for the autos. One for auto, a second positional, and a third from stealth. Backstab for example would do 150% damage from the back if not from stealth. As an example only).

And yes, perfect balance is what we should strive for. The way you get an engaging meta is how does 3 rocks fight off 2 scissors and a paper. Or by making sure not all rocks are polished marbles, but some are fashioned into arrow heads or some such nonsense.

Um no. Perfectly balanced metas lead to static metas. It happened in Chess and Star Craft 1.

Thieves can only heavily burst you if you’re running glass cannon, which is stupid move in WvW. To illustrate, pit a Soldier’s Zerg against a Berserker’s Zerg, and see who wins. I’ve yet to see the Zerker’s win. In short, just because your glass cannon build is meta in PvE doesn’t mean it’s meta in WvW. Enemies are smarter there.

Also, this may shock you but. Thieves run zerker’s because they can’t hope to kill anything remotely tanky without zerker’s. They have neither the damage nor the sustainability, even with stealth. And stealth can be beaten by out-thinking, so it’s already a flimsy defense.