Guild Wars 2

Maybe I should add that, just like incurafy, I’m just asking constructive questions. I personally also find it suboptimal because of the high stealth upkeep. But in the end, whatever rocks your boat I suppose.

Eli:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/pvp/Compensate-won-Solo-TeamQ-with-RankPoints/page/3#post3369916

Valentin.2073:

that’s why it’s an elite skill. it’s supposed to be strong and the most useful skill on a class. l2p. :P
’

Pretty sure most classes have a few elite skills that they think is inferior to a normal utility..

Why a high stealth build in pvp? Besides hot join, how helpful would you be to your team for maintaining stealth (to get maximum out of shadow rejuvenation/shadow refuge)?

I think I get it .. Since SA tree is so overly concentrated in stealth and gives ability to perma stealth (at least pre-patch). They introduced this trait to sabotage you at least 50% of the time. Thus reducing the times you can escape!

Armageddonash, I wish you would just read my post a bit higher instead of replying to ppl who falsely accuse you. I did explain entirely how PW works and how to work with it as opponent. I’m a S/P thief myself and yes we’re rare but it’s not unbeatable.

PS: Thieves never were able to get into enemy spawn using stealth. They used fly hacks to get into the zone where no legendary defender were (the crafting stations).

PW doesn’t do lots of damage in general. It’s power lies in the easy access to stun.
And like said before, the combat log shows you the individual slashes that is all inside 1 pistol whip, not actually how much he used that skill.

Retaliation and blind hurts this build a lot. So does any movement inhibition (immob, chill cripple). Since we need to hit you with the first part of the attack to have the rest hitting you (unless wasting an utility to shadowstep) a movement inhibition will make it very hard for us to connect the first part.
Also, conditions are easy to apply between hits (at least I mostly die from conditions while PW’ing in a node at PvP). So as a necro, spam those conditions.

Also: Stability .. oh stability…

Lopez.7369:

Don’t expect a fix on this until next year. Kind of sad.

So you’re saying: Don’t expect a fix in the coming 9 days? Sounds fairly normal to me.

Have No Faith In Me.1840:

Fact: Thieves have the best mobility
Fact: Warriors have the best land speed (Point A to Point B )
You cannot argue against those facts, because you are simply wrong.

You also need to understand that mobility and land speed are not the same thing.
Mobility:
- Shadowstep
- Dodge roll
- Stealth
- Flanking Strike (thief S/D)

These are things that cause quick and erratic movement whenever you want, wherever you want. They also hamper enemy melee severely, also causes the player to lose focus on you. Thieves do this the best.

Agreed with this terms of definition. Mobility =/= speed
However in terms of speed there should be differentiation between sprint and marathon speed.

As a thief myself I can probably burst enough distance to get OOC (if lucky with random npcs/players in distance) or catch up with someone. Shadowstep, infiltrator’s signet, infiltrator’s strike and steal. So when my skills aren’t on CD I can probably catch a warrior. In the long run though, I’ll need to wait 50s to recharge all skills while the warrior has a low upkeep. He’ll outrun me in a race.

50 points per kill would mean: Flame at anyone solo-capturing a node..

Rednik.3809:

You can win every single fight, but if your enemy control circles, you WILL lose the match.
Situation when your real goal is not PvP but control over 3 points on map – this is wrong approach to PvP imo.

If you can win every single fight, you’ll end up owning all nodes and get +5 points with every kill?

In EU it seems to be less difficult to win in team queue as solo player.. I always join team queue (alone or in team) and have a higher win/lose ratio compared to solo queue.. I just made sure that I’m trained in bunkering as guardian or “zerking” as thief. Judging on how my team looks (or in some instances, after communication) I either bunker or zerk..

(I still prefer going in with a premade because of superior ways of communicating and knowing how your teammates work, knowing when a person is able to survive without support or not… but like some said, going into solo queue just yields worse rewards. And since my win/lose ratio is better in team q, I prefer going team q)

Worst is when 4 of the players go afk because they can’t win
And one person still tries to have some fights or w/e and the entire enemy team zergs on him … well, 4 of the 5 cause I’m the fifth person and just feel sorry for that 1 honourable player

Also, with the breakable panels: Wait for someone to walk on a panel, use devourer’s venom and type /laugh

^That warrior vid, made me laugh out loud

Hard to catch:
When traited, every 15s your infiltrator’s return has no casting time and breaks stun.

Makes the nerf slightly less big while giving you an extra stunbreaker

Running 30 in DA with devourer’s venom usually kills them too. Make sure they waste shadowstep first and then use devourer’s venom. Laugh at them being stuck ^^

I don’t get how the nerf in IR makes the sword no longer viable… I still don’t have trouble dealing with stun… Sure it’s a bit more risky, but “no longer viable” is just a lie

Tried same build for a while,
Used infiltrator’s strike and Shadowstep isntead of poison venom and shadow refuge
Main set was S/P and secondary D/D
Also took 10 in trickery instead for merciful ambush

30/0/0/20/20 right now which focuses on immobilize and to pin down a person like a bunker guardian for your teammates to wear down then.

I thought getting the mail meant you’re accepted for beta, just not which beta yet.. (since they have to set up everything for your guild first)

“Congratulations on being selected to test the new Edge of the Mists WvW map! Please follow the instructions provided for further assistance with setting up this particular account. Please note that the account used for testing the Edge of the Mists does NOT affect the account that you normally use to play Guild Wars 2 in any way, even if the e-mail address is the same. These accounts are entirely separate from one another.”

This was one of the responses I got while corresponding with arenanet (to check if the mails were legitimate)

CrazyDuck.4610:

Exactly, with the initiative buff it makes this tactic just overpowered. And when a thief does 8k dmg backstab teleports back and forth perma immobilizing with no cooldowns it’s pretty ridiculous. I just tried out http://intothemists.com/guides/5-cruuks_decapitation_build and I owned everyone on the map. Now if I actually mastered that build it would be stupid in TPVP, with that initiative regen it makes them just crazy good in T/SPVP. I teleport all around/doing backstabs with perma immob no one can touch me.

Just a heads up: Perma stealth in this build got nerfed, HS 4 times through blackpowder isn’t a valid tactic anymore. Also there is no “teleporting back and forth” with a backstab setup (the teleports are from sword, not dagger, so you have a 9s window between backstab and teleports)
Also, only spamming 2 from sword (for that perma immob) is very weak in solo fights. Only reason to do it is to delay someone from reaching point X or to open windows for your team (I might be wrong here, those are the only reasons I’d use it at least)

Infiltrator’s return now has a 0.25s cast time, which means it can only be used before you’re hit by a hard CC. Combine it with skill delay it’s usually .5-1s making it hard to reflexively use it when you see a stun incoming.

IS-IR isn’t buffed but nerfed, which makes thief (if they use it) use the return part premature just in case a stun would’ve been used.

Clumsy.6257:

Name a set that can outperform berserkers and in what situation.

“Longest surviving time while doing a rain dance with 3 ele’s taking turns in setting you on fire”: Valkyrie > Berserker (there are prolly better sets than valkyrie for this particular situation but meh)

Yasha.5963:

Gwalchgwn.1659:

Not sure anyone suggested this yet but
Use glory and buy 25 level ups?

Its hard for players who have mainly played spvp, we have heaps of glory but no gold (I have played since launch and only had 8 gold before we started getting gold for spvp games).

Didn’t check what you needed for those level ups, only heard from guildies that they needed glory. My mistake

Tpvp: 30/0/0/20/20 here right now (half ini gain, immob stack)
Pre-pre-patch it was: 10/0/0/30/30 (initiative gain)
Pre-patch it was: 30/0/30/10/0 (venom share)

Also, not many ppl run P/P in pvp, there are some but it’s relatively rare to encounter them. (which explains why no on in pvp did this to you before)

Not sure anyone suggested this yet but
Use glory and buy 25 level ups?

Stealth OP, I almost couldn’t find a npc thief, so real thieves are even worse! NERF IT

Aaah, i didn’t get that “chart” either .. thanks for elaborating ^^

Bazzoong.7145:

^°Black Powder is a projectile finisher, so is the scorpion wire that the melee thief uses, again Daggerstorm REFLECTS projectiles. Now I am not going to explain the rest, please THINK.

I’ll explain it,
Use devourer’s with a few melee hits, and then use black powder
Also blank shot on his position, blind field still works without being blinded yourself. And who cares that the melee thief uses scorpion wire on himself? He doesn’t die from it and still gets free hits
Dagger storm is easy to kill.

Also another thing you can use is “bountiful theft” + pistol whip. Stability is a priorited steal on that trait so you’ll also get extra dmg from the ranged thief

Fun to watch the P/P part ^^, you’re getting it nerfed big time :p
Btw don’t use the immob shot 4 times quick after eachother. 3 stacks is maximum (there were a few times, maybe I saw wrong, where the immob didn’t go up because the 3 stacks were still active)
Maybe consider using devourer’s somewhere in there, or panic strike for more lolz

^yeah I think Evilapprentice meant forums as well… :p

Kyrion.2749:

simonerd.8672:

Go to try 20 0 30 20 0 with ambush trap and thief guild before speaking!

In WvsW roaming this is useless, because people always do the same: The moment they see you pop Thieves’ Guild, they retreat, because they know you’ll also use your most powerful venoms on them. They kite you for a while, and even if you manage to chase them, your thieves won’t be able to keep your pace.

I’m not going to answer the rest of your post since I don’t run those skills myself (cause yes, running all those rly hinders defensive abilities, but I do run venom share with 2 venoms and thieves guild when roaming, 3 venoms with basilisk if in team).

It’s easy to kill someone with this combination as long as they don’t clear their immob. You stealth yourself and summon the thieves. Use devourer’s venom once your thieves come up. The enemy will obviously dodge immediately to avoid your first attack, so wait ‘till right after the dodge and hit him. You’ll now have a 05s immob on him and your thieves guild start attacking, which gives a 7s immob (.5s delay from 7.5s theory). If you’re lucky and the enemy triggered his condi clear too soon, the melee thief will still put a 2.5-5s immob on him.
If by any chance you run a sword main, you can put another 1.5s immob on the enemy if he still gets out.
With my own build I also have a 05.5s immob once the enemy falls below 50% health. And this all while thieves guild is hitting him.

Problematic is when they have a long dodge/block ability. Guardians, warrior shield, thief with #3 shortbow spam. But like any build, everything has their weaknesses and this has to be compensated in other tactics (like instead of wasting the second part of your devourer’s venom, just wait it out, or use a stun just when the thief’s #3 runs out)

Bazzoong.7145:

simonerd.8672:

Go to try 20 0 30 20 0 with ambush trap and thief guild before speaking!

Gets hardcountered by daggerstorm you will kill yourself….

Devourer’s venom + black powder and have fun. The ranged thief will die but hey you still have free hits together with the melee thief because the enemy is stuck and not even dodging ^^

PS: a 05s = the bottox .. seriously? Do I have to type my text out for that?

What other utilities do you use besides shadowstep? Maybe you can change something in there.
Honestly the nerf to “stunbreaking” (rly breaking it, not just porting out) did affect me back in the time but changing from that to a casted port didn’t rly do much

I usually start with devourer’s venom. If the enemy is clustered and my team is melee based (cluster part is usual in pvp) I can share the second venom without having to worry much about the location of my allies.
Also, I’m not to worried about getting my venoms shared to all 4 allies. Having 2 of them is good enough.

But then again I don’t run so many venoms together. I only run a maximum of 3 venoms so I have room for 2 stunbreakers. This lowers the problems of having too many CC skills that partially antagonizes eachother.

Also thank you for being the first topic I read today with proper English!

No stunbreaks? Are you actually going 5-venom?
Just take 2-3 venoms and use stunbreakers …

You don’t need all 5 venoms to be effective. Even if your traits are venom based, you’re still SHARING it with other ppl so multiplying the trait by x times. (with X being 1 to 5). In a 2v2 fight venom sharing is very annoying to the other side. 5s immob on both targets (if clustered) and you can also time basilisk to hit before immob is cleared (unless they use a condi clearance, but immob isn’t prioritized in universal condi clearance).

I however agree with the healing. 36s cd on the healing is very long. It’s discussable equal (due to venom share but more likely inferior) to HiS so it should be at most 30-35s (traited 24-28s)

@MyCondolences
Option C is the only reason why I’m crafting to lvl 500 now

It used to be worth the name elite since it was unbreakable. It was really a death sentence back when GC thieves were everywhere. Then it got nerfed over and over …

I’ve got a sort like build but that relies on S/P and D/D secondary. So less stealth
10 points in acrobatics instead of trickery for the vigor trait, regeneration on stealth instead of condi removal (due to less stealthing abilities).

Also instead of residual venoms i take panic strike and I have shadowstep instead of skale venom
Motivation: In general, the enemy will be below 50% by the time devourer’s venom works out so it’ll trigger another 5s immob. I switch to D/D which has a “chill aoe” on swap sigil. This compensates my loss of skale venom (which I did use pre-patch). By this time my health will be low enough to use the healing without losing out on potential healing while also dealing extra damage. Backstab-heartseeker combo usually finishes the job, otherwise I throw in some AA.

If by some reason someone else joins the fight (enemy) I’d use the shadowstep stomp.
When this is blocked i’d switch back to S/P for a stunkill (stun the reviver while dealing damage to the downed person, works wonders against a thief reviver using shadow refuge)

Sry to hear :/ I opened 200 bags (glory bought) and found both recipes … Hope you have more luck next days

vincecontix.1264:

samanosuke.4508:

^ just took the S/P out for a spin and I agree that PW is pretty nice now. It’ll probably go nicely with sundering strikes – time to tinker!

Quick Pockets (init on weapon swap) has had a stealth nerf: 4 > 3 init.

in tpvp or pve? sp is totally broken at competitive lvl of play.

I’m playing it in tPvP, even before this patch and after previous patch. It’s not an easy weapon to use but I did get my rank up to 580 (only a casual pvp’er, so i’m happy with that rank). The current buff makes it deal more damage, though the original nerf (duration stun lower) is still there. I use it to for devourer’s venom though. Start with PW, if it connects immediately cast devourer’s and your enemy is stuck for 5s.

LadyRhonwyn.2501:

Parktou.4263:

Asta Entreri.3945:

How about european guilds? Prioritizing ’murica will bite you back one day…

Chuck Norris disagrees with you…..

Luckily, ANet disagrees with you, because our guild was invited and we’re a European guild…

At least two European guilds from Ring of Fire was invited too.

Burnfall.9573:

As the saying goes, “stand for what is right, fight for what is wrong”

Read that quote again .. You’re going to fight for what is wrong? You’re gonna do all you can to do wrong to people?
Fight “against” what is wrong would be more correct. or “Fight for what is just”

The basic salvage kit also is getting higher drops of runes and sigils though.

Travlane, autoattack used to happen with daggers too. Never read if they actually fixed that. Just try not use auto-attack on #1 and see if it works better that way?

multani.1452:

Female charr thief in da house!

charrs unite

I’m not a necro, just surfing around because I’m bored. But I just wanted to add on nemesis’ comments:

Theoretically your own class is always the easiest to “learn to beat”. It’s easier to learn what to watch for and what the weaknesses are from your own build (by losing) than to learn what another class (your opponent) weaknesses are by winning. Once you are an average player, anyone below average (in your own class) will be easy. While against other opponents the variation will be bigger.

This “average” isn’t 50/50 btw. There’s a very big disparity between under-average players compared to above-average players. Above-average players are ppl who main the class. There are a lot of players that play alternate classes, which means some of their professions are under-average in a serious fight (let’s not assume zergvzerg).

It’s not politically right but, some players just are better in the game in general than others, combine it with more experience in one class (if they main it) it’ll make it easier to beat his own class then another class (NB. He’ll have an easier time beating any other class if it’s played by a less skillful player, but read the first paragraph again).

Arikyali.5804:

Gwalchgwn.1659:

’Cause charr can be female and thief too ^^

Oooh, what kind of dagger is that?

I use moonshank MH and komalie’s sacrificial blade OH. They are both very nice skins, and with moonshank being much bigger than komalie, it’s almost like a “short sword/dagger” feeling.

Main a thief, create your own guild with a co-leader (non-thief). Reap the benefits of being a guildleader

Dual.8953:

I think most Thieves agree that the Infusion of Shadow nerf is needed.

Idd, in fact I’m pretty sure thieves been proposing anet to nerf this trait 6 months ago already, instead of nerfing specific skills that actually made the perma stealthing builds so “loved”. I remember reading suggestion threats about nerfing infusion of shadows.