Guild Wars 2

I really enjoy playing D/F. However, the cooldowns on focus feel ludicrously out of proportion to the benefits of the skills. This has been a longstanding issue, and I would really like to see it addressed.

Several skills are especially problematic: Flamewall, which has a too-narrow area and underwhelming damage; Fire Shield, which stacks Might slowly and is counterproductive to surviving or sustaining in a fight; Freezing Gust, which applies only 3 second of Chill on a 25-second cooldown (compare this to Winter’s Bite, Chillblains, or Spinal Shivers, all of which have lower cooldowns and additional effects); and Gale, which has a 50-second cooldown for a 2s KD (compare this to Backbreaker, Tremor, Line of Warding, and Ring of Warding, all of which have lower cooldowns and additional effects).

As a S/D Thief, these classes consistently give me the most difficulty:

1. Engineers, especially in maps like Skyhammer where they can chain knockbacks to their advantage. I never feel prepared for a fight with an Engi.

2. Mesmers and stealth-based BS Thieves, because they’re slippery. It’s difficult to pressure a target that you can’t keep targeted.

3. Warriors, since almost any shade of Warrior requires constant evasion to avoid chain CC, eating a fistful of damage, or both.

I would like throw gunk to get a different function altogether, really. In PvP it seems like the most useless stolen skill, and it feels only situationally useful in PvE.

Honestly, I think that character is 10/10. The attention to detail is spectacular, especially coordinating with that ghostly glow. She’s wondrous.

I posted my Ele here before, but now that I’ve gotten her re-geared and I’m happy with her look, I thought I would try again:

Ghostwolf.9863:

What: Hard to Catch
Why: This trait places the thief outside my chaos storm…

Sometimes.

I see this question so often that, while I was questing with a friend, I thought it might be prudent to take a quick screenshot of one of the Nightmare Court members in Briarthorn Den. His coloring seems to be a pretty common theme among the Nightmare Court; the only alternative I really see is dark brown skin, or occasionally a really pale “lichen green” color with dark eyes.

After I aggravated a condi Warrior in a 1v1 and they called this trait “cheap,” I decided I loved it. I’m no longer an easy kill.

And Diamond Skin’s nicheness is a welcome throwback to the old Guild Wars buildmaking system. Many of those builds had a peculiar specificity—must be in a stance, target must be under the effect of an enchantment, etc—and that was one of the reasons I loved that build system so much. That oddness made it fun.

I’m trying a build for D/F in PvP now that I’m really enjoying. Hooray for progress!

Now if only the cooldowns weren’t so long.

There’s already a stickied thread for Elementalist pictures.

8/10! It’s a little bit convoluted, but I like the look and the meaning a lot.

I just made two more Sylvari! My Mesmer is named Gwinnel, a descendant of the Old English “Cwenhild”. My Engi is Taniard, from the novel Tansy Taniard.

If I were you, I’d take a gander at the “Guide to Thief Guides” sticky at the top of the Thief forums. It has links for guides for everything, including D/D.

MrAmputatoes.6031:

muscarine.5136:

This is so wrong.

Look, IR got badly nerfed it’s true, but sword is still very efficient.

Wait a bit and you’ll see how this is turning to a “new” S/P trend.

March 11th skill preview.

Thieves seem to be in a decent spot overall since our last balance changes, however, like warrior, the thieves ability to both hard CC an enemy and deal respectable amount of damage is giving the thief too much power. So we have changes for Pistol Whip, Headshot, and Basilisk Venom. On the upside, we have some changes that will hopefully diversify thief build options.

Pistol Whip: Stun removed and instead now applies cripple. Duration 1.5 seconds.
Basilisk Venom: Stun has been reduced to 0.5 seconds and now has a venom duration of 5 seconds.
Head Shot: Stun has been removed and now applies a blind. To compensate for lost power, initiative cost is now 3.
Deadly Arts VII, Improvisation: Bonus damage while holding a bundle has been increases to 12% from 10%.
Critical Strike VII, Ankle Shot: Chance to apply cripple on critical hit has been bumped up to 100%, added an ICD of 15s.
Critical Strike XII, Hidden Killer: Increased critical strike chance from stealth
To 100%, but to compensate, placed an ICD of 15s.
Shadow Art IX, Leeching Venoms: Scaling for both the heal
And the damage has been increased by 25%, moved to grandmaster trait.

Bug Fixes:
Corrected Power of Inertias boon duration. It was giving 15s of might when it should have been giving 5s, this problem has been corrected.
Assassin’s Retreat had the wrong duration and ICD, both have been fixed. swiftness duration is 5s while the ICD is 10s.

Ps… I’m bored…

Some developer somewhere is going see this and think it has some fantastic balance ideas.

Yes, please. I love playing with the Scout skills.

I like that they’re adding new skills, the problems with Skelk Venom aside. Even if it’s an unreliable heal and/or part of a bad skill group (which, in my opinion, it is), it’s another option and helps increase build diversity. That’s a good thing.

However, I do not like the way it’s been instituted. 25 skill points? Really? For level 80 mains with hundreds of skill points and nothing to do with them, unlocking these new heals is no issue, but in no way is this alt-friendly. Nor is it accessible to new players, who are going to wonder why they have to farm skill points for a heal that isn’t all that spectacular.

The other changes have left me with a general feeling of “meh.” A lot of the changes—like Hard to Catch—seem nonsensical, and it looks and feels like they completely ignored the feedback they got from the Thief forums community on their proposal. The initiative buff is going to be a nice change for my build, but since I run S/D, I still feel nerfed. It’s disheartening to get that sensation after most major patches.

For now, I’m distracting myself with Wintersday activities until the dust settles. My opinion might change in the future.

I’d like to see some hairstyles with antlers, horns, or various branches. I’d like to make a “Wiccan” looking male Sylvari, and the options for that style feel a little limited.

I do enjoy most of the hairstyles so far, though, and the new fernbraids hairstyle is just beautiful.

I love a lot of the design choices made for the Sylvari, including most of the new hairstyles and some of these new faces. I adore the first female face, which looks like a softer version of the “branchy” face my Ele has, and I like the third male face because Sylvari males really need more beard choices.

However, I think the noseless faces look more like the faces of cliché sci-fi aliens than the natural, elegant Sylvari (see attachment), especially with the oversized eyes. And, from a biological standpoint, it seems a little odd for those faces to speak with the same vocal tone and intonation as the others.

DiogoSilva.7089:

Likewise, aura builds will no longer have to sacrifice some of their precious traits for the prison that is base attunement cooldowns, in addition to a buff to an aura trait. Earth/ Water bunkers will get buffed because of the Diamond Skin, and because – once more – they’re no longer imprisioned by the high base attunement cooldowns.

One of the main reasons it seems people go 30 into Arcana is not only for the attunement cooldown reduction, but also for Evasive Arcana. As someone who loves EA, I feel like this change is simply giving me less benefit for investing 30 trait points into Arcana.

Brigg.3961:

Can you imagine the amount of QQ from warriors if their “get outta dodge” skills on gs or s/x were nerfed with the same kind of double CD as RTL? Errrrrrmagerrrrd… that would be beautiful to see if they don’t plan on fixing RTL.

If that ever came to pass, I’m be willing to bet that FGS mobility would also end up on the chopping block.

Sanlucifer.1742:

I was wondering if Chill affects initiative, weapon swap, adrenaline or etc? i know for a fact that it affects attunement swap and is really overpower against eles.

So i guess if it does affect the rest of the classes like that is k if not, it shouldn’t affect eles or at least it should affect other classes i guess.

You might want to try playing other classes. It would give you a better understanding of the way their mechanics work, and might be a welcome reprieve from the difficulties of Ele.

To answer your question, chill decreases movement speed and all skill recharges by 66%. It affects basically anything with a cooldown, including: utilities; heals; elites; and the class skill recharge, a category which unfortunately includes attunement swapping. Because it affects movement speed, it also affects the reach of leaping skills like Heartseeker.

It does not affect teleport range or initiative regeneration, and also does not affect adrenaline regen.

Redscope.6215:

Trancid.8514:

+1, this can get crazy with max range cluster bomb, cause it takes forever to land.

This is the exact reason they shouldn’t change how it works. Last thing we need are thieves cbombing while invis. That’d be the new meta. Cbomb+invis+IA, rinse, repeat.

As fun and destructive as it is to CBombard everyone, I might as well be invisible for all the attention I get while doing it. People are much more keen to focus on the opponents in front of them.

kekuso.5837:

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. But the majority of the people just start running at the sight of me

Your look is phenomenal. Would you mind providing a breakdown of what skins you’re using?

I think my female Charr mes is beautiful, but I don’t really know what to do with her in terms of armor. I wish I could show off her fur, as weird as that may sound.

Oxygen.5918:

Imagi.4561:

Dee Jay.2460:

I don’t disagree, but I hope they might just replace Revealed with a better mechanic.

Because frankly Revealed is the worst, most frikkle, buggy and frustrating “anti-stealth” mechanic I have ever witnessed.

I would much rather see active anti-stealth counterplay then the Revealed mechanic, but I feel like that is highly unlikely.

They’re already starting. Sic’em’s going to reveal. That’ll be 4 things to reveal theives; actual revealed mechanic, ranged attacks (and last refuge, plus instinctual response as a bonus), sic’em and leaving shadow refuge.

Yes, but those are simply piled on to the existing Revealed mechanic. The additional anti-steath options they are currently instituting make the entire system look and feel patchwork, like no one’s sure exactly how they want stealth to work.

I would prefer they simply remove the Revealed mechanic and rework stealth, but again, that seems unlikely.

Dee Jay.2460:

I don’t disagree, but I hope they might just replace Revealed with a better mechanic.

Because frankly Revealed is the worst, most frikkle, buggy and frustrating “anti-stealth” mechanic I have ever witnessed.

I would much rather see active anti-stealth counterplay then the Revealed mechanic, but I feel like that is highly unlikely.

wookiee.4631:

Vick.6805:

I don’t think the seeming randomness disproves a ley line pattern theory.

I didn’t mean to imply that there wasn’t a possibility they have to do with ley lines, I was referring to posts that say there is a specific pattern with the location of the Thumpers. Not saying there can’t be, but I don’t think if there is a pattern, it’ll look like this: https://d1ej19d7kwigfi.cloudfront.net/uploads/forum_attachment/file/7129/zusammen.jpg

The end of each one of those “magical ley lines” corresponds with the general position of one of the Elder Dragons. That’s interesting.

I feel very aggravated with this armor situation.

Not only does this armor make all their promises during the initial advertisement of this game look like lip service, but nothing about this armor (aside from the statistical advantage) compels me to get it. It’s intricate, but hideous. I would rather wear my exotics than spend more money to acquire a look I already have, especially for multiple characters.

Edit: typo.

raubvogel.5071:

Trident. I don’t like underwater combat as an elementalist.

I think underwater combat as an Ele is horrendous. It feels unnecessarily clunky and slow, and I feel like half of my skills are useless, or so situational I never find the occasion to employ them.

I wish we at least had 2 choices for underwater weapons. First of all, only having one underwater weapons comes across as lazy development, regardless or whether or not it is. And even if the alternative weapon were worse than the trident, I’d have some sort of choice.

Guardian.5142:

I think daggers would end up being more like “throwing daggers” to stay with the “mesmer theme”.

Mesmer shurikens, gogogogogo!

Sorry, this is a little off-topic, but your armor looks fantastic. I love that dye job.

Did you beat Curie in a duel, yet?

Sanduskel.1850:

his math was…..flawed.

If the math is flawed, then by all means redo it and post your calculations. I’d be very interested to see them.

I think it’s nice in concept—and would certainly be great in PvE—but has a lot of OP potential in PvP with being able to pressure with phantasms and shatters simultaneously.

Ghostwolf.9863:

What you have on the utility-bar is irrelephant to what it recharges.

Ghostwolf.9863:

irrelephant

MyCondolences.8172:

Arkantos.7460:

definitely NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
because venoms are USELESS in solo roaming PVP

PEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE VEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

edit: Actually why the hell would you run a venom share build for solo roaming in PvP!? o.O

For the potentially hilarious YouTube videos.

stof.9341:

Shadow Arts is our healing/support trait line mostly. The Venomous Aura with Leeching Venoms is a kind of heal trait and is improved by healing power. This is why.

Leeching Venoms makes sense in Shadow Arts, but venoms in and of themselves have nothing to do with healing (Skelk Venom excluded), and do not heal unless they are traited for it.

Deadly Arts, on the other hand, is a traitline based around conditions and condition duration. It’s even described on the wiki as “a trait line for the thief that focuses on use of venoms and poison.”

BobbyT.7192:

Travlane.5948:

they said “venoms WERE almost there”….

2 things wrong with this…3 if u count the fact devs dont play thief.

1) venoms are never even close to “there”
2) even if they were…this heal wouldnt bring them their.

venoms are built around the fact that you have to sacrifice a whole build setup, traitline , armors runes and sigils just to use. then even when you do…u activate them and sit there like an kitten for 45 seconds hoping you dont die bc of the lack of defense. all venoms should be on 20-25 seconsd timer max. MAX.

compare basilisk venom to any other stun in game. its the worst one. ….if not THE worst ONE of the worst. seriously. joke. scale venom? sure but wont work in power builds. so many problems with venoms.

they should be made so they are good without venomshare. soooo bad. so lame. wont use. thanks for hte laughs tho.

I’m saying they should make the venomshare base, if your going to balance venom around a single trait, why do we have to spent 30 points in for it

Or at least put it in Deadly Arts, which is based around conditions anyways. I don’t want to have to sink 30 points into Shadow Arts—a tratline I hate for PvE—so that I can make a build that has nothing whatsoever to do with stealth.

SoLeciTO.3490:

Zacchary.6183:

AlexEBT.7240:

Burnfall.9573:

As the saying goes, “when one violate the rule of balance, so shall their end be violated”

I’m pretty sure that warrants an infraction for the sexual assault “undertones” present in the quote.

:C Don’t infractucate him! Burnfall my favorite troll…. better than sandy anyways.

Yup agree, at least Burnfall use more brains when he writes . . . you almost believe his not a troll.

Except now his posts are starting to sound like mistranslated fortune cookies.

Marge.4035:

Doesn’t matter how much I want to make a character that’s supposed to stand out a little, I always end up making everything toned-down. T_T

Toned-down or not, I love her look. Elegant and whimsical.

warbreaker.8154:

I will be so happy if this is what gets reskinned for the new Flamekissed armor, at least for the female version.

/crosses fingers.

Yes, please.

Brave Mallyki.1563:

So, since it is a venom it can be shared with others by using the venom sharing trait, right? Are we going to be see a switch to venom thieves now?

Pls no. I want no part of a venom meta.

Aneirin Cadwall.9126:

I agree with you, actually. That was only subtly conveyed by my reply, though. No profession should have powerful status effects available without a cooldown, and in my big book of games development, the thief (or rather the way stealth and initiative are implemented) is ArenaNet’s greatest sin.

I’m a little confused by your comments. How are Thief venoms “powerful status effects available without a cooldown”, if that’s the inference you’re making? They’re utilities—so equipping them requires sacrificing more versatile skills, like deceptions—and they each of a base cooldown of 45 seconds.

Burnfall.9573:

As the saying goes, “when one violate the rule of balance, so shall their end be violated”

LordByron.8369:

FrownyClown.8402:

I used to hate thieves back when I played this game on my toaster. Some important things to note:

1.When a thief stealths he is trying to position himself behind you for a backstab.
2. Air aura is your friend
3. They are weak against conditions. Even if you have like 300 condition damage, if you land a drakes breath on them it could take 3k of their health while they are stealthed.

Few things i won t agree with:

1) if you can predict a thief, the thief is a bad player…..nothing to do with the profession itself…
The fact most thief players are predictable doesn t mean the clas IS predictable.

What logic did you use to come to that conclusion? Most classes are predictable in one way or another because of rotations. This is a matter of efficiency, not “badness.”

LordByron.8369:

3) They cleanse condition in stealth.

The condi cleanse in and of itself removes one condition every 3 seconds while in stealth. Considering most stealth skills last 3-4 seconds, that’s one condition per stealth. Eles can apply conditions much faster than that.

LordByron.8369:

-even if they die they may recover before you can see them.

I assume you mean they can get downed and recover, but I really don’t think this happens to Thief more so than any other class (that award likely goes to Rangers, with their pet res ability). Most players are quite bloodthirsty over kills, so even with the misdirection of stealth and teleportation it’s hard for a Thief to escape death once they’ve been downed.

LordByron.8369:

Only way to kill a thief is bursting them…and hoping they are glass.

On the contrary, in my experience it’s much more difficult to fight Eles who bring sustain. A burst is easy to avoid—especially with an Ele, where it’s typically very telegraphed—while sustain damage/conditions is hard to mitigate.

Auesis.7301:

Ignore venom-sharing builds. They detract so much from your personal DPS that encounters will drag out immensely and your supportive measures will be wasted when the fight could have ended sooner and less room for error would have been created.

Seconded. Venom-sharing requires investing 20 points into Deadly Arts and 30 points into Shadow Arts, traitlines which I think are massively less helpful in PvE compared to Critical Strikes and Acrobatics.

Not to mention that venoms in general are pretty lackluster, even when shared.

A friend of mine, and one of the Thief community’s most passionate theorycrafters, says “Thank you for asking us for counters. You are better than most people.”

And indeed, thank you for being willing to learn. Most people come, complain, and leave.

Galtrix.7369:

lordkrall.7241:

Because both Necro and Warrior have much worse defensive/restorative capabilities than Ele and Guardian.

Name 3 defensive/restorative skills that the Elementalist has. I have an 80 Elementalist and I sure can’t name that many.

I’m entirely positive you’re trolling, but for the sake of helping the community here are a few Ele skills that qualify as “defensive” or “restorative”:

Staff
Geyser
Healing Rain
Gust
Static Field
Magnetic Aura
Unsteady Ground

Scepter
Water Trident
Blinding Flash
Rock Barrier
Dust Devil

Dagger
mainhand
Cone of Cold
Shocking Aura
offhand
Frost Aura
Updraft

Focus
Fire Shield
Swirling Winds
Gale
Magnetic Wave
Obsidian flesh

Utilities
Arcane Shield
Armor of Earth
Mist Form
Conjure: Earth Shield
Signet of Air
Signet of Earth
Signet of Water

Greyfur.1082:

crosknight.3041:

snip

They look even worse on a Charr.

I disagree; I thought they looked way worse on my Human.

As it is now, the health pools at level 80 (including vitality) are 10,805 at the lowest, 15,082 for the medium, and 18,372 at the highest. That’s a difference of 4,277 between the lowest and the mid, but only 3,290 between the medium and the highest…and the highest and lowest values are separated by an incredible 7,567. To me, that looks like an arbitrary setup with no discernible logic behind those values or differences.

I’d like to see the discrepancy lowered between the health pools. The common suggestion on the forums—that I agree with—is to change it to 12,000 → 15,000 →18,000. This creates symmetry, and I imagine would make it worlds easier to balance.

Henri Blanche.8276:

Imagi.4561:

When people who kill champions outside of the zerg are no longer subject to public shaming for being “selfish” and “rude”, I’ll be willing to consider their “freedom” as an actual topic of debate.

I think there will always be a few bad apples; but I suspect that your experience is more a reflection of your server than anything else.

While I guest at other servers I’ve found Ehmry Bay to be very pleasant. So long as you’re not going out of your way to ruin the train folks there seem to live and let live.

And I recall a particularly nice moment where a few folks at Frostgorge Sound politely asked the train to skip the Quaggan so that they could tackle it on their own. There was a universal response of approval and folks cheered them on and did not interfere.

It’s quite possible that it’s a server issue, and it’s nice to know that there are servers out there that can be cordial to one another. My experiences haven’t been entirely negative, of course, but I’ve seen the champion train at the epicenter of too much conflict to ever consider it a positive fixture overall.

Maugetarr.6823:

Second coming of spiteful spirit

Oh God.

Leamas.5803:

Imagi.4561:

Blacklight.2871:

Hard to believe there are people who embrace the stripping away of their freedom, but of course, it’s usually not THEIR freedom at stake, but someone else’s.

“Freedom”? Oh, please. You make the champion train sound like a victim march.

When people who kill champions outside of the zerg are no longer subject to public shaming for being “selfish” and “rude”, I’ll be willing to consider their “freedom” as an actual topic of debate.

It’s a game, if someone says something you don’t like, block them and ignore them. It’s not like they can do anything other than badmouth you. :/

Oh, I agree completely. But I think “the zerg should be able to play how they want to play” is a ridiculous argument when the “play how you want” mindset is exactly what it discourages.

I know I’m coming across as hostile, but please don’t misunderstand—I don’t have a problem with the champion train in and of itself. I think it provides some great benefits and I’ve participated in it on many occasions. However, I do have a problem with the sense of entitlement present in some of the participants: that the train has more of a right to the champions than anyone else playing the game. It creates a toxic community environment.