I find battles in GW2 last about as long as battles in most fighting games I play, which I feel is a good balance. I generally build to adaquitly survive so I never go down in a suddenly. I think people who go down in a flash were for the most part in a mismatch. They weren’t prepared to deal with thier opponent, so they lost badly.
@PowerBottom: Okay I’m going to point this out. Adding a longer wait time isn’t going to detour Thieves from going for the BS combo, it’s already practically ok cooldowns, especially the ones that employ basalisk venom. And a change like what you’re suggesting would hurt balanced builds more then the burst builds.
A thief has teleports built into their weapon kit, allowing them to teleport directly onto an opponent and pistol whip them. Pistol whip has a built-in stun that locks the target in place and forces them to eat the attack. Pistol whip makes the thief evade for the whole duration, so they do not take any damage during the animation.
A warrior has to use up utility skills to do the same thing as a thief, which is severely limiting. Bull’s rush must be used to gap-close to the target (40 second cooldown). 100B is a 3.5 second channel with the strongest hit at the very end of the animation, so Frenzy (60 second cooldown) is required to do any damage with 100B or else the opponent would simply walk away. While the warrior is in frenzy, the warrior receives 50% amplified damage, making them extremely fragile. That leaves the warrior with only one utility skill open.
A warrior must sacrifice a lot to make 100B work, while a thief can remain as flexible as ever. There is no comparison.
Pistol Whip is infinitely safer and easier to use the HB, but you kinda make PW sound insanely strong when it actually has lower DPS then Auto-Attack.
If you’re going to lose and you can still get away, do it. Saves respawn time, wastes the enemy’s time, and if you get away you can regroup faster. If you can come up with a counter attack afterward and get the initiative, you may even come out on top. That said, the balance is, you should try not to give up too early, if you can still be a pain or still kite then do so.
Also, when in a group, devote some of your focus to aiding your teammates. Deserting too early is way worse then running from a 1 on 1 too early.
This system would pretty much make more thieves resort to BS. The Initiative system idealy is a use as needed kind of system, which is which is why thieves have so few dps focused skills. On top of that, of their damage focused skills, Heartseekers the only one that can be spammed. Deathblossom, Unload, Pistol Whip, all can’t really be used more the 3 times before the thief is out of initiative and can’t weapon skill again for a few seconds. Sure it looks like thieves mash buttons to win, but in reality, thieves don’t have rotations like other classes so they’re pretty lacking in options for sustained dps.
I think a simpler and more effective solution would be to switch Heartseeker from a dps focused skill, to a utility focused skill. Like lower it’s base damage, raise it’s bonus damage, and make the damage bonus much more strict, like it’d only do base damage until the target is below 10% health, and perhaps raise the skill’s point cost to 4. This would theoretically make HS, weaker then auto attack when spammed before the bonus kicks in, forcing it to be used for it’s utilities. (Gap closer, Leap finisher, finishing blow)
The only thing that will work is to give them cool downs like everyone else.
Does revealed count as the cooldown? Albeit it’s quite short.
Well reveal is a mechanic in use and you see how things are. I meant give each one of their abilities a cool down like every other profession.
I’d like to point out two things. One, the OP BS combo is on cooldowns, Steal, Assassin Signet, Haste and Basalisk Venom all have CDs. Two, Thieves’ initiative is a lot more limiting then people seem to think. They can’t sustain dps solely on skills like other classes because they can’t use rotations. Take an ele or warrior, when they’re out of skills on one weapon set, they can simply switch to another set/atunement. If a Thief uses all their Initiative, they’re on global CD for their weapon skills unless they replenish their initiative with a trait or utility. Sure HS, can be used in rapid succession, but can you name another damage focused thief skill that can be used more then 2 or 3 times in a row? I suppose there’s Clusterbomb, but that skill’s kinda slow, and ground target. (There’s the aquaric weapons, but aquatic thief is a whole other beast, doesn’t even have many stealths other then Hide in Shadows.)
So if the ability is already worthless/useless/weak, so easily countered, then that must mean that nobody builds around it any more. It’s a non-skill like the Elementalist skill Shatterstone. That must also mean that nobody will then mind if it gets nerfed, right?
OH WAIT, no, it’s not like that at all.
Either it’s so bad that nerfs to it are irrelevant and thus not worth arguing over or the people who are saying it’s awful are wrong about its effectiveness.
Or it could be that that the skill has high potential, but the cost to tap that potential is so high that it’s not viable as a way to deal high damage in anything above beginner level play.
HB can hit very hard, the trick of it is any player that understands stunbreaks and dodging can evade the skill and counter it.
One button wonders have no place in PvP, let alone ‘competitive’ PvP.
Yet Sniper Rifles and Rocket Launchers exist in tournament level Fps games. Sorry, think more before you make broad overgeneralizing statements. We’ve already gotten past the threat of HB, let’s not backpedal.
This is not an Fps, and even FPS’s are scaled down, you cant fire a 50cal from the hip let alone survive a bullet from one regardless it hitting your head or not..
Not sure where you’re going after the RPG vs Fps point. Regardless, as stated by myself and various other players, HB is easy to deal with, and was widely regarded as weak against anyone paying attention to the battle, so let’s not dumb the game down so people can play carelessly.
One button wonders have no place in PvP, let alone ‘competitive’ PvP.
Yet Sniper Rifles and Rocket Launchers exist in tournament level Fps games. Sorry, think more before you make broad overgeneralizing statements. We’ve already gotten past the threat of HB, let’s not backpedal.
I think you missed a factor of Thief’s combat. The reason why so many D/D thieves go 222222 until they exhaust themselves. Take a look at the D/D weapon set, it has Heartseeker, a leaping gap closing damage skill which is tilted towards being a killing blow, Death Blossom, a evading Whirl finisher that stacks on bleeding, yet can only be used 2-3 times in rapid succession. Then there’s Dancing Dagger, a bouncing AoE cripple which recently received a large nerf to its damage, and finally Cloak and Dagger, a melee strike that on-hit applies stealth on hit and has also taken a large damage nerf. You should notice that the weapon set has 2 skills that deal are tilted towards doing damage, and 2 skills that are tilted towards thier secondary effect. Now observe the S/D set, Infiltrator’s Strike/Shadow Return, a low damaging skill that shadowsteps the user to their target and can be used again to stunbreak the user back to their initial position, Flanking Strike, a skill evades then strikes for medium damage and strips a boon from its target with an unblockable strike, the last two skills are Dancing Dagger and Cloak and Dagger again. Now lets straight up compare these two sets. D/D, one power/crit damage skill, one condition damage skill, 2 utility skills, and for S/D, 4 utility skills. I propose your chang won’t change much for thieves as a whole. The HS spammers will still spam HS, BS thieves won’t be effected, DB would actually be stronger this way, and S/D would be at least a little less survivable. So I can’t see your change helping things in the long run.
Yes, you are right.
When 50 people blame a rendering issue on their inability to counter one single player, something must be done, but it is not the something you obviously think it is.
Hmm
When many people complain about a block bug on their inability to counter one single bunker, something must be done in the same manner right?
A bug/exploit/mechanical failure which has a major detrimental effect on gameplay must be accounted for. Because of the rendering issue one single class is capable at times of being invisible 100% of the time while killing someone or denying a cap for an objective.
Trying to defend this as ‘ok’ in any way shape or form is just asinine.
Well they’ve stated in this thread that they’re changing the capping rules of WvW to those of sPvP. So that should have an impact on the whole invis-cap blocking at the very least. As for culling, I wondering how much of the issue is server side and how much of it is local.
I find I make more in WvW then I do in PvE. Try looking up some ways to amass wealth. We’ve got some very wealthy players in the game, so there’s gotta be at least a few good tricks out there.
Streamline. You can look at this 2 ways. You can see how your enemies used the game’s systems to their advantage and learn from it adopting the tactic and taking advantage of it and perhaps formulating a counter to it, or you can complain about it and ask Anet to tailor the difficulty to you.
Now I ask you, which helps you become a better player?
In an upcoming patch the WvW capture points will be updated to follow the same rules as the PvP capture points with respect to invisibility & invulnerability. As a result invisible & invulnerable players will no longer contest capture points.
I agree with pretty everything but your downed state points. They shouldn’t simply allow suicide, it’d remove a level of tactics from the game. If they did add suicide, it should be an automatic 25 points for the other team.
Might be kinda cool if they let necros keep their minions and bring back the stray minions mechanic.
Simple answer, Thieves(and mesmers FYI) can finish ppl while stealthed, because they don´t have better option like other classes (stability or invulnerability or both is much better than stealth in this case).
And we can be finished while in stealth, so no problem here, until Anet fixes channeling on invisible targets (which is another great flaw in stealth design imho…)
First off, I said, “If a player can finish…” I wasn’t referring to thieves exclusively seeing as there are obviously multiple ways any profession can acquire stealth.
Secondly, thieves have five skills that grant stealth. The profession with the most access to stability-granting skills is the warrior with a maximum of three sources. So thieves are actually ahead, if you want to consider stealth a substitute for stability. The only skill that allows a player to finish somebody with the aid of invulnerability is Obsidian Flesh. Unfortunately, the focus isn’t all that viable of a weapon for an elementalist in PvP.
Thirdly, there is no downed skill that grants stability for any profession. And even if there was, stability doesn’t negate being finished. Elementalists have access to invulnerability when downed, but normally only have one opportunity to use it before they’re finished, balancing them with every other profession.
Finally, as Dee Jay said, stealthed targets cannot be finished.
The next time you are getting stomped by a stability powered guardian or an invulnerable elementalist and a thief comes and stealths you, you’d better tell him how it is such crap that you can avoid stomps with stealth.
You can deal damage and target a player with stability, which in some cases could be enough to decide whether or not they live to finish you. As I stated above, Obsidian Flesh is the only skill that does not restrict you from finishing a player while invulnerable. Mist Form can be used mid-cast, but there’s still an opportunity for the elementalist to be interrupted. You can’t interrupt what you can’t see.
That last part’s where you’re wrong. Thieves get interrupted all the time by CC’s, be it Guardian’s pulse, the AoE of a ally who’s wise to the thief, or stray CC.
15 mesmers and BAM. Your litter zerg just became 45 cloneman warfare.
I think my classmate did this once with his guild. Spawned a ton of Clones and Phantasms for ganks with a mass shatter at the end. Sounded pretty insane. Also heard of players rolling identical mesmers with similar names to add to the confusion.
Thieves also have Nine Tailed Strike which only costs 3 initiative instead of the 5 required for Shadow Assault. Thief spear underwater is really really unbalanced, in PvE as well as PvP.
I’m not sure if there’s a real way to deal with it right now, but the a fix Anet could implement would simply be increasing the initiative cost for the skill so that it couldn’t be kept up for so long, or to reduce the duration for the same effect.
Again, has anyone tried ranged attack? Shadow Assault is like an under water version of Blurred Frenzy, it roots the Thief and it doesn’t have a specific target. Nine Tailed Strike is purely a melee counter so it’s lacking in range. Thier only gap closer is Tow Line, which is like an inverse Scorpion Wire. In other words, if you avoid Melee Range, Thief isn’t anything special. At a range, just be sure to avoid Hasted Deluge.
Try kiting the Thief, Spear is mostly defensive and counter melee skills, and Speargun doesn’t have many defensive options. Thief’s alsi much more limited in stealth options underwater.
Funny thing about stealth stomps, they’re actually the weakest of the protected stomps when you think about it because they can still be CC’d like normal (well quick stomps might be weaker, but it’s kind if a waste to quick stomp in the first place). With Stab and Mist, sure you can see it, but can you stop it.
its very easy to identify a mesmer.. there are some easy tools how to recognize it
1) knowelage – you need to know how mesmers skills works
2) mark – just mark your mesmer and keep him targeted.
3) blink / decoy are easily recognised
4) clones never kite even they dont move (they attack you only). So the one who is moving.. is the mesmer
5) clones never dodgeroll
6) keep an eye on what weapon mesmer is using against you (staff = phase retreat, sword = swap, greatsword = bouncing attack). When you know what weapon is against you, you basically know when he create clone
.. play a mesmer for 1-2 week. Then you recognize 90% very fast where is your mesmer.
It’s pointless to target mesmers……phase retreat and target drop, and the skill is on a 8s CD lol
Depends on whether the Mesmer’s packing a staff or not. And it’s a 10 second CD unless they’re carrying Chaotic Dampening. And on top of that, if you can’t pick out the real mesmer, you really need to pay more attention to details. They’re usually pretty obvious to me, unless they go as far as to mimic their own clones (which means they’d have to be holding a 2-handers and just standing auto attacking. And process of elimination doesn’t take that long.
I think the thing with thing with Mes and Thief in Clocktower is more a clocktower needs to be patched issue. That or their using the old teleport mechanics from the beta.
Thief is probably the best Roamer scout class in WvW. As the QQ suggest, they exceed and taking down loaners who do not have exceptional skill. Ele’s can be pretty impressive, able to take down groups of 4 alone, and Mesmer’s can employ some insanely game changing tactics. Not sure about other classes, but they all seem to contribute in their own way. Just as I said, Thieves are by far the best at surviving alone. That said, if you play a thief, pick your battles carefully. Thief’s efficiency in battle sharply declines as you add more enemies. You’ll have to single out your targets, cause you have little to no chance if a group of enemies manage to catch you. And D/D, Thief’s most damaging weapon set in primarily single targeting. The main thing is, whatever you choose, keep an eye on where your enemies are, in large fight, keep an eye on the battle lines, overextend and you’ll probably die.
Only thieves that do decent damage on HS are glass cannons. At the end of the day, they’re HS is just fluff on my Warrior. My S/S Warrior is mean to Glass thieves.
For more team communication I think it would need:
1) a sufficient amount of downtime (which it generally doesn’t have). There’s a very short downtime before the match. During the match, it’s possible that there’s downtime during point capture, but usually in any particularly competitive match the opposing team is there to contest it.
2) and better tools for communication (e.g., drawing lines on the map like in GW1).
Anyways, because of the auto-balance (and ability to join with friends), I don’t think consecutive win rewards are a good idea.
Yeah, bring back the drawing an map pings. Maybe add some pre-scripted phrases too. Like if you see an enemy and target them, they’ll ping on the map. Maybe add an built in mic system too. Anything that can easy up on the need to stop and type.
Nerf demanding Masses in a BS thread: “At least with HB you can see Bullrush coming and dodge it”
Nerf demanding Masses in a HB thread: “OMG bullrush + HB is OP! Dodging does nothing! Nerf Nao!”
I swear these people want to play without having to think.
>_>
@lDarko: Just pointing out, BS combo always blows 1-3 cooldowns. Mug, Assassin’s Signet and Basalisk Venom.
heh, dont bother to argue with Archaon, check his previous posts, he`s always rude. Probably scared that his “i win” button will get nerfed.
I`m not sure what is wrong with the thief community but its full of people like him.
It’s probably because 95% of time on the forums when a person has trouble with thieves they demand nerfs, all while showing little effort at trying to understand thieves and throwing as many insults at the thief players as possible. Most would be happy to help someone asking advice but no one likes to be slandered, especially by the ignorant.
Just pointing out, Blurred Frenzy does less damage then Hundred Blades, but it also buffs the Mesmer with Distortion, making the Mesmer invicible while performing the skills. As Hundred Blades has no inherent defense and no way to make way to hold its victim in place without the aid of a CC, the skill is very easy to counter. Couple that with the fact that the fact that many warriors use Frenzy with HB and the skill becomes a weak point which anyone with a understanding of evading, stun breaks can take advantage of.
Wonder if is a deliberate way the devs are trying to keep players from bunkering down and point gaurding wanting the meta to be something more dynamic. Then on that note, making it so points are held by the larger population might do a better job at that.
pistol whip = teleport + ministun + lots of dmg + rooted on place
hundred blades = lots of dmg + rooted on place
do you see the difference why pistol whip needed much more nerf then hundred blades? HB works only in combination with another skill, just dodge it, blind warr when he tries to stun you, use some invulnerability, you have time to react
Actually Pistol Whip doesn’t have a teleport. That’s the Thief using Infiltrator’s Strike right before activating Pistol Whip. That said, Hundred Blade is as strong as it is clumsy. It’s easy enough to evade and flank the user. Wonder what it’d be like it HB was what it was after they remade it in GW1, changing from a quick AoE to a buff that makes all your attacks AoE for a few seconds.
I run Sword/Dagger and Shortbow and I find Thieves fun. Signet of Shadows is down right addictive. Everyone feels slow after equipping it. Infiltrator’s Shot is ideal for getting past environmental traps like the spear traps in the Shark Maw JP, and I can use Shadow Refuge to complete Communing Skill Challenges and mine Ores unchallenged. Haven’t tried Dungeons yet, mainly for lack of time.
@Stiv: The bug report was there last I checked. They just moved it, to the options iirc.
As for my thoughts on WvW. I love it, if for nothing less then contributing to the cause of my fellow server members. It’s fun setting up siege weapons in clever locations for optimal offense and defense.
now it is the fault of the community if the game is decaying day by day?
lol ok if you like to think so
Meanwhile anet was good and did everything possible for his community
most beautiful side of the coin
Again, it has nothing to do with who’s job it is to make the game successful. It’s being proactive.
If you don’t want to help make this happen, that’s fine. If this becomes successful and you want to get in on the action, that’s fine too.
if i buy a car with no radio and they said me the radio was in the price of the car, i wont start sing while driving until they will give me the radio.
unluckly the wideogaming “world” has his own rules and companies can do what they please after they received OUR money.
we payed full game to play bwes’ (alpha test) and now we are still playing a closed beta (you have to pay the game to play so it is closed). and what we have now? 2 devs to take care of a portion of the game. and look…seems they don’t care about a lot of things they said neither a lot of nice suggestions by community. and one year ago they claimed gw2 as an esport….one year ago, and still we have NO infrastructure for esport.
nice
So you’re frustrated at the devs. This thread isn’t about the devs, it’s about a community project. If you want to complain about the devs, do it in another thread.
now it is the fault of the community if the game is decaying day by day?
lol ok if you like to think so
Meanwhile anet was good and did everything possible for his community
most beautiful side of the coin
Again, it has nothing to do with who’s job it is to make the game successful. It’s being proactive.
If you don’t want to help make this happen, that’s fine. If this becomes successful and you want to get in on the action, that’s fine too.
I’d imagine a Greatsword would be good for a Mesmer to use on thieves. Stealth can’t break channels so the basic attack would point them out until it ended lessening the amount of time they’re hidden, and the shockwave (5 iirc) could knock them out of thier Shadow Refuge.
I don’t think it should be forced upon the players to find clever ways to try to have fun in PvP. That’s mostly fault with the developers.
If someone you live with turned on the TV in the room then left, and you don’t like the show that’s on, doesn’t it make more sense to go over and turn it off/change the channel instead of screaming at the top of your lungs how you don’t like what’s playing?
You can’t change the channel because there’s only one channel available.
You want people to create their own channel so they can experience something competitive?
I think most people will just turn the TV off.
Then the trick is getting enough dedicated people to join in. As the core group grows, it’ll become more visible to those on the outside, and will get easier to get into. It can grow to the point that people those that “Just turn the TV off” will consider it a viable option. In short, many great things start small.
Seriously, what is ’’IT’’?
There’s no Custom Arena’s/WvW maps, and you can’t world PvP (or duel). They’re really limiting our options here.
I understand you organize stuff in hotjoin lobbies and WvW… But that’s not going to satisfy the competitive need that players, and Gw2 sorely need.
Could start off with Player created customs. Like how in GW1 Ectos became a form of currency or how during Wintersday, everyone went Grenth in Odd Servers and Dwayna in Even.
I don’t think it should be forced upon the players to find clever ways to try to have fun in PvP. That’s mostly fault with the developers.
And that’s why you fail. Nothing is being forced upon anyone. If you want to have fun in sPvP and that’s not happening utilizing the developer provided content, rather than incessantly whining day in and day out, wouldn’t it make more sense to try organize something to have fun? Isn’t that what this is all about?
If someone you live with turned on the TV in the room then left, and you don’t like the show that’s on, doesn’t it make more sense to go over and turn it off/change the channel instead of screaming at the top of your lungs how you don’t like what’s playing?
You can’t change the channel because there’s only one channel available.
You want people to create their own channel so they can experience something competitive?
I think most people will just turn the TV off.
Then the trick is getting enough dedicated people to join in. As the core group grows, it’ll become more visible to those on the outside, and will get easier to get into. It can grow to the point that people those that “Just turn the TV off” will consider it a viable option. In short, many great things start small.
Well first and for most, this plan needs some kind of way to communicate. Like site, board or facebook page. Someone with skills in programming sites would be an asset.
I don’t think it should be forced upon the players to find clever ways to try to have fun in PvP. That’s mostly fault with the developers.
This here isn’t the dev’s forcing us as players to do anything. This is players taking charge of the situation to make a better experience for ourselves. Neat idea honestly.
I do just fine in PvE and WvW with S/D, SB, I go 0/0/20/30/20. With and usually take Shadow Refuge, Infiltrator’s Signet, Withdraw and Thieves Guild. I generally go Caltrops or Scorpion Wire as my last utility slot (been experimenting) and switch to Dagger Storm if there’s a lot of ranged attacks flying around.
I saw someone post this in the last game I played and have seen it at work. And in that game it was possible to stun a player to death with no downside. In GW2, at least we have counters for everything if one’s willing to look.
@Malady: From my PoV as an S/D thief, initiative isn’t an infinite well to spam for which to spam from but rather a means to let me use my weapon skills for their utility as needed. As for stealth, well it doesn’t count for much when the AoEs start flying. If you’re caught in one you’re going to want to get out of it, just like everyone else.
