Guild Wars 2

A couple things. Gem sales are based off of total server population, not WvW population. All servers that are “Very High” will cost roughly the same whether in Tier 1 or Tier 4.

There is no confirmation on how White Swords will be changed. There is also no confirmation whether this is 25 or more allied players or 25+ players from any server in one area. Without further details, these sort of claims are quite a bit premature. As it is, the map having swords at all probably gives away too much information. If anything, this change allows your small 5-10 man groups be even more deadly on a map.

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/warrior/?8|2.1n.h17|c.1p.h4.e.1g.h15|1c.7x.1c.0.1c.0.1c.0.1c.0.1c.0|3v.0.3s.0.3u.0.1p.61.1n.64.1c.64|0.0.k1a.u18c.k6a|54.7|e

There you go. There is a specific guide to go with it, but that is what I run. Keep in mind that this is WvW and I am maximizing my DPS while traiting for shout heals, hammer cooldowns, and higher survivability.

I thought the build was very nice and well done. Just a question, why not Divinity Runes? I feel like the sacrifice of 24 Precision and 60 power is worth the other positives that you would get out of it, aside from the fact it appears you have bank.

The GS build that someone posted a couple replies below the OP was very refreshing as well. It actually had Vitality and other traits built into it instead of being full glass. It is people thinking outside the box of only full zerker being viable that gives me hope that people will respect me as a Warrior instead of expecting full glass GS when I run a dungeon.

Personally, I run tanky dps on almost everything I build so, while this probably isn’t the build for me, it is a breath of fresh air compared to the norm. Honestly, the post title saying “enough zerker warriors” is pretty on track with how many people continue to defend GS as the only option insist on flaming him for Axe/Axe being more appropriate for the in-game situation that HE encounters personally. I’ve got my own high dps GS/Hammer spec I’ve been meaning to make, but that’s because I am a WvW player. So from a PvP perspective, your logic seems to be very sound, especially since, in PvP, I rarely see good GS warriors ever use HB so I understand the problem with being rooted vs mobility for your burst attacks, especially since it cleaves so you don’t have the benefits of it being targeted (see Thief Backstab/HS).

Also, anyone that ever says L2P because someone thinks differently than them is a kitten and should probably be ignored for the pure ignorance that they convey.

Vanthian.9267:

Esoteric.5490:

I maximize my damage while having a lot of tanky stats.

Maxing damage on a “tank Warrior build” (I use tank in the lightest meaning possible as there is no such thing as a Warrior Bunker/Tank in the PvP setting) means having around 1,200 power for a final attack rating of around 2,500 attack… Sure you can might stack up to around 3,000ish, but you are missing the real reason why Damaged Traited/Geared people do a ton of damage; Critical Damage.

Esoteric.5490:

I consider my dps to be pretty good despite my tanky stats and I’d love to know what you consider “average” crit chance or crit damage to be on what you consider to be a “tanky” build.

I would say average or relativity low critical chance is around 40%.

Both excellent points. My base crit chance is around 19-21% and I gain about 30% more putting me at roughly 50% with my food/oil/fury up. My build has permanent fury so it is always around 50%. I have also traited into Discipline giving me 20% crit chance with another 30% coming from trinkets or weapons. By using maintenance oils, I make up for about 200 precision with my toughness and vitality at the levels they are. This gives me roughly 50% of both crit chance and damage which hits for big damage on a hammer, especially with stacked might. I run a sigil of bloodlust as well since power stacks exceptionally with crit damage. My guild group also stacks a LOT of might so I regularly have 20-25 stacks, 8-11 sustained by myself. I really don’t have problems with damage and haven’t sacrificed any of the elements of being a “tank” in doing so. It is about maximizing a build, which some people who think “raw damage from a GS and that the ‘base health pool’ is high enough in large combat”, don’t understand. Maybe in sPvP it works, but not in WvW, which I think was the individual’s assertion that I responded to.

CookMETEnder.7582:

Esoteric.5490:

Red Falcon.8257:

Noooo then all those shout healing wammos will spread that bad build even more…
I’m already tired enough I have to team with Warriors dealing half my damage just to toss 1.2k heals.

Well is half your damage compared to you being full glass cannon on a thief, or a GS warrior? If so, then most normal builds will do half of your damage…

Honestly, my damage is really not that hindered in order to run shout heals… Having permanent 8-11+ stacks of might and permanent fury sort of makes up for building a bit tanky and having the highest base health and highest base armor in the game. It also gives you plenty of ability to stack offensive stats in your trinkets while keeping 27k health and 3.1k armor. I have roughly 50% crit damage, 50% crit chance, and 3,200 attack with those defensive stats (this includes food/oil). It is all about maximizing your build. Most people think warrior is easy and faceroll status, but anyone is impressed when a warrior is very good and plays at an elite level.

Yes, you’re damage is hindered greatly to run a shout heal build.
8-11+ stacks of might can be sustained by any GS user w/ the trait.
Vitality is rather wasted on a warrior. Toughness is usually better because of the high base pool of HP.
50% crit and 50% chance are low, even for a “tanky” build.

I maximize my damage while having a lot of tanky stats. Your opinions on Warrior likely have you run mostly offensive stats with a great sword and something like dual axes with Knight’s Armor and Berserker Trinkets, which is not “tanky”, not to mention the entire premise of your argument involves running GS, which locks you into going AT LEAST 20 points into Arms and, very likely, 20 points into strength as well. 20k health on a warrior is ridiculously low. You have the luxury of stacking less health than other classes are forced to, but high health and high armor are never a bad thing. I consider my dps to be pretty good despite my tanky stats and I’d love to know what you consider “average” crit chance or crit damage to be on what you consider to be a “tanky” build. The high base armor and high base health hardly make up for the fact that you are mainly a MELEE class without adding to both of those stats.

So yes, if you are running a Greatsword with offensive traits and offtank (Knight’s/Valkyrie’s) armor/trinkets, maybe even with some Berserker’s stuff, your offensive stats will be better than a “tanky” build because that build is not tanky…

*It is worthy of noting that I am a WvW player, so my Warrior experience stems from there.

Monsoon.2589:

Now anet what you need to do is open these zones in red and make all these a giant single map…no portals

DO IT NAO

You have my support. The geography would obviously be an advantage for some servers who would have to run a long freaking way to get from their borderland on the West to their enemy’s borderland on the East. Maybe make it so you need to go through Eternal Battlegrounds (with wider borders to transit) to get between borders while being able to spawn at your respective citadels?

Honestly, the way the maps are set up, I don’t think it is possible, but I would kill for a single map the size of all 4 and have localized loading (or something) to reduce the lag of such a massive area. Massive armies roaming the countryside… That would be glorious. Increase Treb/Cata range and push the towers further apart too. I want MASSIVE warfare.

Sam.3645:

Sunspots.9861:

Here’s an exciting look at last night from [PiNK]’s perspective. Pretty raw footage but it was a great series of fights so I left it all the way to my own demise! Enjoy! Make sure to watch it in 1080p.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTTQ5poq0RY

There was a Anet Dev (Who I shall not name) that ran with our zerg, let’s see if you guys can spot him in that cluster of kittens :P

We murdered him on your trebs from Vale hitting outer Bay. He promptly proceeded to log. :P

Blackg…errr Kaineng Borderland update.

Short answer is full soldier’s gear or a mix of soldier’s gear and cleric’s gear, run sword/shield and hammer. 0/0/30/30/10. Run shout heals.

I’d say the large NA guilds we’ve gotten only cement our NA presence even further. We have a very solid crew and put up huge PPT during NA time. Usually between +350 to +400 all night.

Posted the same thing last week. It’s pathetic.

This is the best list I’ve read in a while. Not 100% on everything mentioned, but it is a great start and definitely things that need to be addressed.

Please communicate with us, ANet. When you leave us in the dark because our updates aren’t coming, it just adds to the fear and speculation that we are being ignored and pushed aside.

Generally speaking, if I get XP for a kill, I get a bloodlust stack. I use a hammer for most large fights so my stacking sigil is on my sword, so I normally swap to my sword towards the end before the last 7-8 people get finished off to get some free stacks since I already tagged them. Most of the time, 1 crit or 2 normal un-critted attacks will do enough damage to get the tag. Basically, you only get a stack when your stacking weapon is out and you get the experience for a kill.

If you put on a lot of conditions, tags are usually harder to get over a burst type of build since people get downed sometimes before your conditions really start to wear them down.

I have run both sets to great success. It really depends on how well you dodge and what your traits/food/oil choices are. With P/T/V you can do a ton of damage. Just make sure that your trinkets make up for where you are lacking. My trinkets give me a fair amount of crit damage and precision and my weapons do as well. I sit at rougly 26.5k health and 3.1k armor while doing great damage. Just look at what you need to optimize. You can build tanky dps easier on a warrior than any other class. Take advantage of the fact you have the highest base health and highest base armor in the game. Even with full knight’s gear you get a LOT of toughness (and I mean a LOT). Add in Valk trinkets as needed for the vitality or go full into tactics for shout heals and the vitality/boon duration there. The warrior has so many viable options for specs in the tanky dps field, just choose what best suits your playstyle.

Red Falcon.8257:

Noooo then all those shout healing wammos will spread that bad build even more…
I’m already tired enough I have to team with Warriors dealing half my damage just to toss 1.2k heals.

Well is half your damage compared to you being full glass cannon on a thief, or a GS warrior? If so, then most normal builds will do half of your damage…

Honestly, my damage is really not that hindered in order to run shout heals… Having permanent 8-11+ stacks of might and permanent fury sort of makes up for building a bit tanky and having the highest base health and highest base armor in the game. It also gives you plenty of ability to stack offensive stats in your trinkets while keeping 27k health and 3.1k armor. I have roughly 50% crit damage, 50% crit chance, and 3,200 attack with those defensive stats (this includes food/oil). It is all about maximizing your build. Most people think warrior is easy and faceroll status, but anyone is impressed when a warrior is very good and plays at an elite level.

It would be nice if everyone wasn’t out trying to show off their kittens… I mean, seriously, are you guys honestly arguing about who wiped who in an open field fight?

Bring back IWAY! It was there in Beta!

Why should warriors have to put points into a tree where there is basically 1 trait and every other class gets 2 no matter where they put their points?

The point of the burst skill is supposed to be charged up and do good damage, but it does mediocre damage on most weapons (sans axe and rifle) and you can’t even spec for it to do any sort of noticeable increase in damage. If kill shot and eviscerate are the real problem, nerf their. It seems a lot more prudent to do that then devaluing other skills for anything other than utility.

Tell me how many warriors use GS F1. Now tell me how many elementalists use attunements or how many mesmers use their shatters. That is a serious problem. I rest my case.

Genev.2450:

Esoteric.5490:

This thread has really devolved into name dropping and petty bickering. I’d like someone to actually address a guild that is the total package and not just “awesome at open field”. I’ve said it before, RG is a fun fight in the open field, but they don’t really take points.

Motion to rename the thread: “Best Projected Guilds at GvG”

There’s is no such thing as an overall best guilds. Good guilds get know because of excelling in particular fields, and the RG steamroll is worth a salute. Just as I’m sure quite a few other guilds which get mentioned repeatedly deserve this mention.

On the other hand, I’ve seen a guild mentioned in this thread which is just… yeah, it made me laugh.

That’s an issue too. This thread is about recognition so I’m not about to trash talk anyone, but I will say that a lot of people are getting acclaim because they are a big-name, well-known guild, not so much for actually being talented.

This thread has really devolved into name dropping and petty bickering. I’d like someone to actually address a guild that is the total package and not just “awesome at open field”. I’ve said it before; RG is a fun fight in the open field, but they don’t really take points.

Motion to rename the thread: “Best Projected Guilds at GvG”

Someone made the argument to nerf an entire trait line to justify the damage base on certain weapons… If kill shot was not meant to do as much damage or eviscerate was not meant to do as much with the burst damage % boost, then nerf the base and allow people to spec so that their burst skills can do a lot more damage. As it is, other professions get full 1:1 scaling for their class-based trait while warriors get 1:10. The only class to be nerfed as such. When I first started playing at head start, I reported it as a bug because I put 10 points in and only got 1% of a bonus…

It isn’t really a “burst” skill if you are using it solely for utility and it’s damage is outdone by normal weapon skills…

Funny you should ask….

/barf

12chars

This thread is just a lot of server posturing. I was scratching my head about the passion with which JQ was defended above…someone got it right when they said that Guild =/= Server, so servers should be left out of this conversation.

There are a lot of great, top notch guilds. Some do things better than others. A guild that gets a ton of PPT isn’t as high regarded as a guild who “wins in the open field”. Last I checked, the open field was far away from towers and things that actually gave points. Taking objectives, defending them, or winning skirmishes are all integral. It goes far beyond a guild excelling at one of them to be “the best”. For example, RG is great in the open field, but I’ve never seen them take a tower.

EnRohbi.2187:

Oh my god, no.

Part of the reason I WvW and almost never go into sPvP is because of how the gearing is set up in sPvP.

I want to be able to combine my equipment and get the stats I want.
My build is impossible to replicate with the sPvP amulet system.

You also do realize that Anet wants sPvP to be the competitive side of their game, right?

They would prefer wvw players go into sPvP than sPvP players go into wvw.

QFT

I won’t touch sPvP because of the fail that is the amulet system. I think the amulet system should be scrapped and let people use their PvE characters for PvP like you used to be able to in GW1. I worked way too hard to get my armor, weapons, and other gear by playing ONLY WvW (not farming gold for them, mind you) to go to sPvP and see my gear look like absolute kitten and have my build not exist.

The fact that the vast MAJORITY of builds cannot be replicated in sPvP shows that it is a terrible system. Sure, they want a balanced system, so let people be leveled up and have “PvP Only Gear” if they aren’t 80 (or even if they are), but give them the option of using their PvE gear as well. Make the stats equivalent and let people use trinkets and pick armor with the stats in it. Hell, they could even leave it as is if the amulet stat totals are equivalent to the amount of stats you can get from your PvE gear so you always have the option to wear your PvE gear in sPvP instead… That way people who want to rank up in sPvP and get cool gear that way and gain rank can do that, but people can also choose to build their character in PvE and be ON EVEN GROUND.

Still balanced, but gives variety and customization which is crucial to anything that desires to be an “esport”. League of Legends has over 100 champions and probably a couple hundred items. sPvP pales in comparison.

tl;dr: Get rid of sPvP Amulets, let players choose to use updated sPvP gear that is equal to the best PvE gear or use their own gear from PvE like in GW1 OR leave amulets as they are, make sure that the stats you get from them are equal to the max stats you get from PvE, and let people choose to use their PvE gear in sPvP.

WvW is inherently imbalanced. That was always the point…

Had some bad information. Our EU guys don’t seem to have issues though, so I don’t think it is a problem. Oceanics and SEA players have to use NA servers as well so…

The most realistic solution is to merge EU and NA and merge lower pop servers into the mid-pop servers or with other lower-pop servers. This would be upsetting to me, at least, because I’m very attached to the name “Blackgate” and our server community and this would undoubtedly change server names. Something about a rose by any other name, but it still means a lot to WvW players especially. However, if you are still making the argument about “nightcapping” being unfair, sorry to burst your bubble, but it has been said it is intended for months.

There will never be a system that makes points worth less at certain times of the day. What if a server, such as Kaineng, which has mostly SEA and Korean players got less points when they are on? Then the work of the 5,000 on the other side would be wiped out by the 5,000 on the NA side simple because they play on this side of the ocean. If that doesn’t wipe this theory, I don’t know what does. It’s a coverage game. Sure, there could be significant work done to the scoring system, but it will never make players’ contributions worth less because they are active at off hours or in other countries when they PAID FOR this game just like you.

With this line of logic, the game should shut down for 16 hours a day and only be live for 8 hours from 5pm-1am EST…

Also, if you stop looking at the graph where one server is smashing the other, you would realize the score is only 4k apart. Seems like the Blue server has been doing just fine for themselves when they have the advantage numbers-wise.

peter.9024:

Yeah op is correct, right now the entire trait line doesn’t match up with other professions, which get significant profession specific bonus compared to warriors. Another thing I’d note are the horrible revive specific minor traits in tactics. Make them selectable of you want to focus on reviving, but don’t make them mandatory minor traits.

Since I play WvW, I actually really like those minor traits. I’m a front line tank so it seems fitting to be a combat medic.

So let me start by saying that I have played Warrior for over 1000 hours. Most of this time has been spent in WvW with some limited time in PvE to get gold and grinding to 80. I am also Rank 10 in sPvP.

The Discipline Tree gives you 1% Crit Damage per point you put in. That is a perfectly good ratio. If it was any more, it would be ridiculous. I love the signet cooldown, the 5 second weapon swaps, and the movement skills break immobilize, so I run 20 points in Discipline pretty frequently.

The problem I have with this tree is the increase in your Burst Damage for how many points you put in is basically worthless. You get a .1% increase in burst damage for every point you put in. Apparently, in BWE #1, burst damage would increase by 1% per trait point. Now you have to use 10 trait points just to get the same amount of Burst Damage bonus that you used to get with 1 point.

That is literally a 90% nerf to a trait and I am struggling to understand why it was nerfed into the ground so horribly because now I have 20 trait points that I would rather have in condition damage or condition duration or power or toughness or any singular trait other than burst damage because a 2% increase in burst damage for 20 trait points is worthless.

My best guess is that the rationale for this decision was because kill shot would be doing something ridiculous like critting for 30k, but why would you not simply nerf the damage on kill shot to leave the trait scaling the same, or at least not nerf the scaling into the ground?

Let’s review what this 2% bonus in damage does. So let’s say that I crit on an Earthshaker, my crit does maybe 3k damage. That 2% would increased my damage by 60. That’s right, 60 bonus damage on a 3k crit. I’d be better off running a Sigil of Force.

If the scaling was even 50% of what it was originally and I got .5% increase in burst damage per point, 10 points would give me 5%, 20 points would give me a 10% increase and 30 points would give a 15% increase, hardly OP considering that you have to invest 30 points in the tree to get a PROFESSION UNIQUE stat that all other professions have scale normally for theirs.

Considering that adrenaline is a consumable resource unique to the warrior, it seems odd that the only use we would have for our burst skill is utility rather than actually being able to damage with it. Ele’s get a faster cooldown on their attunements, and mesmers get faster cooldowns on their shatters, both traits that massively increase their dps. However, Warrior burst skills sit there and are more useful by not being used if you want damage from your profession unique resource by using Berserker’s Power or heightened focus.

ANet, I am pleading with you here, can you change the scaling from Trait Points -> Burst Damage %? The only way that this damage can be remotely OP is by using kill shot and MAYBE Eviscerate. The logical solution here is to nerf the damage base on those abilities rather than nerfing ALL burst skills for a Warrior by changing the scaling for an entire trait rather than the source of the problem. Sweeping nerfs only serve to hurt the game and this is no exception.

If you would not like to change the scaling to make those 20 trait points actually worth something, I’d like 200 power statically added to my character so that my traits are worth as much as other professions’ and you can just keep the burst damage.

Dhampyr.2104:

Well, since there’s just no way we can leave TC out of this, I guess we’re back to the Tier 2 secession idea…

Edit: Tarnished Kaingate?

We shall have to inform ANet immediately. If they wish to stop the secession we shall wait for them in Garrison. They can send who they want to stop us, but I guarantee they will never see us coming when we strike (no, really, culling is that bad). A little tongue in cheek there. :P

Full disclosure, both FoE and Agg have started moves to Blackgate. FoE has made a formal announcement, but I do not believe Agg has, at least publicly.

TC, hop on our back; you’re coming to Tier 1 with us.

I can see it now “Black Coast” or “Tarnished Gate”. I love you guys so much and I have a confession: I was on Tarnished Coast for the first 3 days after launch before moving to Blackgate (I wanted to join a decent WvW server and TC was getting smashed by NSP and I didn’t understand the tier system).

Also, to the Kaineng Sylvari who had the drop on me on the southern island in TC BL last night around 2am server time and walked past me instead of trying to kill me, you are awesome. I had my chat open and was talking to someone when you stopped in front, then walked right past me. I waved and bowed when I noticed what you were doing. Some faith in humanity has been restored for me.

Dhampyr.2104:

I wonder if T2 can secede from the Union…

Tier 2 Confederacy forever!

Great fights tonight. [KnT] got to spend some time on every single map. Shout out to the PiNK/KH group that took our Tier 3 hills in KN BL, we just couldn’t zone in enough people to fend you off. Basically we ran in there, said “we can wipe once and if we do, it’s back to BG BL to defend Bay”. You won that battle and a well deserved keep I must say

Intigo, that isn’t the way we have it here, but that is probably based on playstyle differences and how we build. We have necros with the same playtime as our guards and warriors and they have roughly 40k while we have 20k. Just how it works out for us.

We also play defense and play for points a lot more than open field fighting like RG tends to. I must say though, we got to have some great fun with you all while you were visiting across the pond

I got 100 badges tonight from killing people. Sure, the exotic armor you buy for badges should probably cost less since it doesn’t convert very well to the effort needed to get the same stats from dungeon tokens(HotW or AC), but I think it is bad enough that there is a jumping puzzle where people can get a gift of battle without ever killing a single player in WvW.

For the record, I have 4500 badges of honor. They aren’t hard to get. If people could get them without having to fight other than the jumping puzzle, you’d have even more players in WvW “repairing” walls. I put that in quotes because we all know they would just go to SM and waste all the supply just for the badges. Making them drop from players only makes you actually fight in PvP, imagine that. The other things you mentioned are mostly a way to just farm them, and I don’t think that was ever the intent. If you want farming, go to AC, it has anything that you could ever get from WvW with badges and will give you plenty of money to buy whatever siege you want.

I do agree that support classes need to get a better loot table, though. Not sure how to do it exactly, but if you heal and give a ton of boons, you are just as important as the damage dealers.

shortcake.8659:

Hammer isn’t good for tagging? lolwut. My warrior has no problem getting the vast majority of kills in fights.

It’s probably something to do with playstyle. Just because a weapon cleaves, however, it is no comparison to an Ele dropping aoe. I get a lot of kills, but nowhere near the count of ranged dps classes.

How many kills does your hammer warrior have?

20,297 kills on my warrior. A LOT of hours in WvW. Hammer and Sword/Shield are not the greatest for tagging.

You can’t guest on another server for WvW. Also, I don’t think we’ve been blue server in over 3 months. It’s a biproduct of stagnation in the bracket where servers aren’t moving up and down, they find their true rank and sort of sit there.

There are many time where we take any given point on the map, just be heads up when you are in WvW, especially at weird hours (before and after NA prime or NA morning) and it’s very likely we’ll take one of the points you need.

Still asking for a lock. This is going downhill fast.

I see no point of flaming. No one is leaving Blackgate to go to SoR. I’d say there is far too much bad blood between our servers.

Also, it costs $22.50 to move to any of the Top 3 tiers pretty much; don’t think guilds are forking that out. They will form a thing called server pride if they haven’t already or they’ll quit the game if they decide they don’t like their server at this point.

Can this just get locked? No good can come of this thread.

ower.9143:

let’s see, 4pm PST. TC all blue, FA 80% blue, BG 80% green only pushing Red, EB evenly split between green and blue. Yeah clearly they’re not mad or working together.

Well, to be fair, I’ve noticed FA has a tendency to try and suckerpunch us when we aren’t looking, so then we go over and teach them a lesson. They tried to take Greenlake on TC BL, so we took their corner of the map. Little things like that.

This match isn’t super high stakes and it’s Thursday. Speaking candidly, a lot of assaults or offensives are purely reactionary. Any semblance of grand strategy that any of our servers had likely ended after Tuesday.

Most ranged weapons don’t really have an auto attack chain is the problem there. Warriors have chains for just about any weapon and since they all cleave, it is very easy to tell if you hit something. I have noticed that Sword is the most noticeable chain animation.

Would be nice if you see damage numbers when you hit something invisible though. Don’t see why it shouldn’t show you that. Even if something were to be “invisible” you’d still feel it if you cut it in half with a big kitten sword.

Oozo,

The patch was never an actual fix. It is really a reallocation of resources, a trade, if you will. It is highly likely that individuals are judging this patch based on the false pretense of “fixed culling” when in actuality it simply shows more enemies and less friendlies, which I don’t see how that makes WvW less playable. There certainly could be a bug, you know, in addition to the absurd queues and pop caps.

For the record, someone has to play the devil’s advocate here.

I just wish they could learn something from their PvP in GW1. It was amazing (GvG and HoH).

You’re right, this game mode gets nowhere near 30% of the attention and it is sickening.

Sunspots.9861:

The question is, will they underestimate us?

Almost certainly. Blackgate has a little surprise in store to welcome them to competitive WvW.

Sunspots.9861:

Uhhh no rating reset??? Are we doing this again next week?

Looks like FA is headed back to Tier 3 and Kaineng will jump to #2 in the match by a couple rating. Still subject to change on the seeding, but Kaineng is almost certainly in Tier 2.

Docherty.8372:

Esoteric.5490:

Thieves are not OP, people literally just don’t think how to kill them. If you stun or knockdown a thief, they are dead. I’m not sure they have a single stun break, at least not that is worth bringing.

Shadowstep.

Roll for Initiative.

Infiltrator’s Signet.

Haste.

Infiltrator’s Strike/Return – spammable teleport (no cooldown), breaks stun, scrubs condition, immobilizes opponent…

I carry three of these at all times on my Thief; if I’m holding a sword your control abilities are worthless, as I’ll hit return on IS and be back riding your nuts in under 1/2 a second.

Why do people keep defending Thieves… when they apparently know jack spit about what Thieves are even capable of?

I’m well aware of what they are capable of. This thread is in a WvW forum. In WvW, Thieves get cc’d and they die. If they shadow refuge, you Earthshaker and they have a 2 second stun. You are blowing a hell of a lot of initiative just to live, rolls and all. Point being, at that point you have to make a choice to survive or have damage. Not to mention that you can “stunbreak” all you want because if you are glass, then you will blow up before you get the chance. Also, if you aren’t glass, then I’d love to see you try to burst through my warrior.

Still not OP.