Guild Wars 2

Please. The people who kick Thieves out of their parties, are probably not the same people who will understand the nuances of Thief damage. You’re ranting at the wrong people for the wrong reason.

D/D is fine.

Give me the Thief playing a style that they are familiar with, rather than someone mashing their way through some spec that’s alien to them.

NinjaEd.3946:

Except steal cooldown was reduced by 10 seconds a long time ago.

Except nothing. We both know that the functionality hasn’t changed since release, so let’s not pretend like a cooldown reduction opens the floodgates for your wish list.

Travlane.5948:

anyway backstab requires perfect conditions and skill to set up.

It requires that you hit someone from the side/back with Dagger #1 while stealthed. It’s not rocket science. Thief has an kit designed around helping you create the opportunity for this. It’s just a matter of execution.

Travlane.5948:

would u call dagger sustained dmg too?

Only the autoattack, for those times when you’re actually using it as something other than filler.

BS takes 3-4x longer than PW bc it requires a few things. stealth, run behind opponent, strike successfully.

Oh please. PW takes just as long because you have to open the GW2 client and log in first.

Burst damage is measured from the alpha hit, not some random point in the past chosen to flatten out the time for the sake of your silly definitions. When you execute a Backstab combo, you are throwing out a huge amount of damage in a small amount of time, and CnD forces non-damage downtime at the end. That’s what burst damage is.

never really spammed so i wouldnt call it back endheavy in the sense that using it

It doesn’t really matter what you call it, because it is what it is. Pistol Whip’s wind-up and recovery force time into your damage rotation. Outside of gimmicky wombo-combo setups, PW takes time to deal damage, and as stated previously is not necessarily your BnB damage skill in the first place.

basically to say ….thief has onlY SB as a sustained dmg.

This is nonsense. Shortbow has sustained damage, but so does Sword. that word “sustained” does not imply “flat”. Pistol Whip auto-evades, and manual dodges are short duration and fast recovery. A graph of your damage does not need to resemble a plateau. The difference between S/P’s and D/x Backstab playstyles, and the resulting damage distribution, is pretty straightforward.

Travlane.5948:

dagger auto attack is similar to sword but a tiny bit faster. i guess dagger is sustained too.

Dagger has Backstab, which is about as bursty as you get, since you have other hard-hitting things to combine it with.

Nobody is running around plowing targets with Tactical Strike.

Travlane.5948:

skills 2-5. show me what is sustained.

Skills #2, 4 and 5 don’t have damage worth making hay over.

Skill #3 has all of its damage backloaded on the end of the skill. You can’t get there without going through the wind-up, stun, and aftercast recovery of the first hit (which doesn’t hit very hard).

Skill #1 is in the same situation as Pistol Whip, the biggest hit is at the end of the chain, and it has a considerable windup.

omg its like 2nd grade in here.

Enough with this, please. If you keep getting infracted, you’re eventually going to get banned.

evilapprentice.6379:

Cleansing Ire would like to say Hello.

Cleansing Ire can walk in the door when it’s tied to endurance instead of Adrenaline.

There’s really no reason to restrict the conditions it removes when it’s on a five second ICD And tied to an action – if it removed the condition passively, I’d agree with you, but since it costs endurance to access the condition removal, it seems fair. I’d prefer all conditions and 7-8s ICD over 5s and limited condition removal – thief already has plenty of limited condition removal skills.

It costs endurance, but any spec with FoF has Feline Grace, plus access to Vigor on heal and Signet of Agility. Evading doesn’t even require that you have a target, or otherwise burn a CD or put yourself into danger by attacking someone. Endurance is the only pre-condition.

Limiting FoF to movement-based conditions sets it opposite Pain Response (which I wouldn’t be opposed to tweaking either), and forces you to either make a choice about what you want to be vulnerable to, or go 30 points and give up your GM slot to double up.

evilapprentice.6379:

Edit: I Just re-read my original response, and can see how it might be confusing – when I said “All Conditions” I meant not restricted to Just weakness and cripple – Just remove a single condition, regardless which condition it is. If that’s what you were referring to, ignore the rant below

That’s what I was referring to. But even in the case where it only removes one condition, a 5sec ICD in a Master trait is still too good.

1. Master tier
2. All conditions
3. 5sec ICD

Pick two. I’d prefer that Fleet of Foot just had a lower ICD and a moderately expanded set of conditions that it clears. It has Crippled and Weakness, I’d add other movement-based conditions like Immobilize, Chill, and maaaybe Torment to a possible pool of removed conditions, with some sensible priority order.

evilapprentice.6379:

Fleet of foot should be changed to all conditions, have its ICD changed to 5s, and be combined with Quick recovery. Neither is currently worth slotting, but combined and with these tweaks it would be worth slotting.

That’s ludicrous. If you gave Thief omni-condition removal on dodge with a 5sec ICD, nobody would ever spec anything else in that slot, and you’d probably create the 20 Acro meta. You’d counter entire classes with one trait.

OIIIIIO.7825:

S/P can be used to spike Interceptor.2653 I have seen google.#### play a S/P Spike build in a tournament with signets. Pre-casting PW then blinking to the target for the flurry. I watched him instantly bursting I believe Five Gauge (was definitely an engineer he was bursting) several times in the match.

That’s fair enough, and I do something similar when I have 10 CS, but it’s pretty gimmicky and only works for one shot. The recycle on that maneuver is pretty long because of cooldowns. It doesn’t really define the weaponset, which in the other 99% of situations is sustained DPS.

Travlane.5948:

im talking about ruen #6. its not worth taking a full runeset for.

You made your point poorly, then.

What other two runes are you combining with Lyssa?

u dont get anything from 5 secs of boons other than perhaps aegis used and 1 or 2 attacks EVERY SO SLIGHTLY boosted dmg.

This is total nonsense. You get Aegis, Might, Swiftness, Protection, Stability, Regen, Fury, Retaliation and Vigor. Only two of those boons have “meh” utility; everything else is doing useful work. It’s even better if you have boon duration, and get 6.5 seconds out of it.

actually even with lyssa runes u need to bring the same amount of condi cleanse you always do.

Almost the same amount. The thing with Lyssa is that it gives you an immediate “get out of condition spam” moment, which isn’t available with anything else in our kit. Like, it’s unique utility. Shadowstep is the only thing that comes close, but it has a longer effective CD and only does three conditions.

Wouldn’t be the first time the wiki was wrong; I had to fix a healing ratio the other day that was off by a factor of seven. Place needs some QC.

Tachii.3506:

@ interceptor: Uh. I only said stability last for 3 seconds, which is what lyssa runes does. All the other boons are at 5 seconds.

No, that’s not what it does. Lyssa #6 gives 5 seconds of all boons, including Stability, and all are impacted by boon duration as appropriate. The only weird interaction that Lyssa’s has with Stability, is that the #4 bonus boon can’t give it.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Triggering the health regen from PR is nice and all, but the real reason someone would pick it up is for the condition removal.

How would someone who doesn’t use Pain Response, know why someone else would pick it up? It’s already been well-established here that you are very inexperienced with how this trait actually operates in the real world, not to mention that you’re hand-waving a ~1,700 health Regen, for no apparent reason other than that it’s inconvenient to your point. There could be more trait options for condition removal for Thieves, but as it stands there is still enough access through utilities/runes/food/skills to make up the difference.

Burning Fire was literally given its new functionality as of the last balance patch. It also has a 40s ICD and lacks the secondary healing effect, so it’s hardly superior to PR in those respects.

Travlane.5948:

also…guys…u cant call a weaponset spike, sustained, or condi on AA alone. :P

S/P doesn’t even know what “spike” is. It’s a sustained DPS weaponset. End of story.

^ Welcome to Thief. We barely crack 10k base HP at level 80. However, note that he included a lot of Toughness (Armor gets up to 3000), and the playstyle involves a lot of healing during stealth and condition removal, so it’s workable in real situations.

But uhh, Applied Fortitude is probably going to be your friend regardless. And a lot of us will throw a little Vitality into a build if we need to.

Travlane.5948:

yes. that IS nice. but thats ALL that really changes from lyssa runes. the boons are useless really. you get a one time cleanse. but in the long term of a fight/battle i can show that otherrunes give more productivity. perhaps not condi cleans but more dmg or more dmg reduction or utitlity etc.

I’ve got bad news: both of you are wrong.

The guy you’re replying to is wrong, because the boons on Lyssa #6 last for 5 seconds, not 3 seconds. They are also subject to boon duration modifiers, which means a 30 Acrobatics Thief has 6.5 seconds on all buffs. That’s plenty of time to make something happen or turn a fight around.

And you are wrong, because Lyssa #4 (random boon on Heal) is quite excellent. The boon lasts for 10s at base (and again, for Acrobatics Thieves, up to 13s), and only one boon (Swiftness) is kinda lame. Pair Lyssa along Withdraw, and you are cooking with fire. Protection is especially hilarious when you get it.

Tachii.3506:

It is dodgeable. Idk if it actually goes through aegis, I don’t think it does.

It doesn’t. We do have some unblockable skills/utilities, but venoms ain’t one of them. Aegis, evade, block, blind, etc will all stuff those things.

EDIT: this is an advantage for Residual Venoms with Basilisk, if anyone was curious. Helps a lot when there’s a Guardian around.

^ Who has one of those? Aegis, evade etc can eat a Basilisk application.

You won’t like it for PvE. For WvW roaming (solo or small group), you can slot it into any P/D condition-based build (which can easily leverage the stats on that piece).

Nimrud.5642:

So if I have a good group and coordination, then I’ll be fine with the thief too? (If I dont have a good group then being a warrior/guard wont save me either.)

Correct. You won’t be strictly the best option, but this game is full of people who aren’t Warriors/Guardians that still want to do dungeons, so you can play with them and succeed, albeit more slowly.

So I just add some surviveability through weapon choice/traits/gear and I’ll be just as functional as a warrior?

Sort of. You’ll probably want to get survival through weaponskill like Black Powder rather than traits/gear, since you don’t want to hurt your damage output (primary thing a Thief brings to PvE), but basically you have the means available to you to be a contributor.

do these “What profession is good for… ?” questions make sense? I mean I saw warroirs ranked as the total underdogs of PvP in threads that are a few months old, and now they are top. Going a little further back in time and you see the same with elementalists. Is the PvE class balance also a roller-coaster like in PvP? Or should I level a warr and a guard if I want a safe spot in meta PvE comp?

As you have already figured out, predicting the future is a fool’s errand. balance changes knock people off the top of the hill all of the time.

The best thing to do, is just play what you enjoy, because it means you’re going to have fun no matter what the situation is.

EDIT: that being said, I think Guardians are basically immune to the meta. They always seem to be useful for something.

Viking Jorun.5413:

What people fail to realize is that sword AA is very strong, able to maintain permanent crippled and weakness, which will destroy any power spec. Combined with your blind field, you should have no problems taking down warriors. I only find PW more suitable during fights against PU mesmers and necros who swap to staff and kite, so the PW, S2+PW, PW+InfSig, PW+Steal combo will definitely wreck classes of that category.

He was talking about raw damage, not overall utility. The autoattack chain definitely loses in terms of vanilla DPS. Obviously things change a bit when you include secondary factors like conditions, mobility, etc.

P.S.: please take a deep breath, this topic is not worth losing your temper over.

Dahkeus.8243:

Wait…why are people saying AA does more damage than PW? […] PW used to be about on par with AAs, but with the last two buffs that decreased the aftercast, it is a lot better.

^ This. People need to update their talking points, or something. It’s not the same set that it was in 2012.

Speaking of which, people talking about S/P “burst” need to clarify what they are referring to. S/P only has two high-damage skills (#1 and #3), and both of them are slow with largely back-loaded damage, i.e. the punch is towards the end of the strike. You aren’t compressing the damage without Haste or Critical Haste.

I guess it’s bursty compared to a glacier or something, but not compared to other thief weaponsets.

Lamuness.3570:

S/D + S/P are both LOLMASH3.

Why did you quote his post if you didn’t even read it? If you mash #3 on S/P, the only kills you’ll get are critters, guards, uplevels, people who are AFK, and yourself. Every weapon skill on S/P is useful in one regard or another. Even the autoattack.

WRT ascended: put your money towards ascended weapons, and your laurels/pristines/badges/commendations towards trinkets. Armor can wait until the very last: the gain over exotic vs. what you spend getting there is not usually worth it.

Exotics are available from the TP, dungeons, or via WvW badges + gold depending on what you are looking for. Bookmark this page: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Equipment_acquisition_by_stats

Oh, and I guess I should add one more thing, since I guess you’re not familiar with S/P.

Black Powder is the #5 skill on S/P. It blinds the target, throws down a Smoke field, keeps re-blinding people in the AOE for the duration, and heals for 414+ with Assassin’s Reward. When a target is blinded, they automatically miss their next attack. It’s useful to protect yourself while still being able to deal damage.

I also like it for stomping Guards, Warriors, Necros, Engineers, and Rangers.

SA gives your toughness to stay in the fight which reduces the necessity to dodge attack — meaning you’re doing more DPS; because there’s no DPS when you dodge. That’s the common mistake of someone about SA, they jump to conclusion that it’s all about stealthing and sneaking. The combination of toughness and healing power in this trait ensure that you have a lot of staying power.

Why did you bother asking me for my build if you were just going to ignore it? I itemize for Toughness by wearing Knight’s and/or bits of Soldier’s. I have ~2400 Armor. Surely you must understand that I wouldn’t even crack 2000 if I had no Toughness anywhere.

Fun fact: I also have access to Protection from Lyssa, plus whatever I can Steal from someone else. Elite gives a short-duration Prot, but it’s especially lollerskates when I win the roll of the dice and get 13s of Protection it from pushing #6, because now I can fight a Warrior straight-up.

If you have no where to go, how is Withdraw any better? It’s actually even worst because they don’t have to guess where you are.

Withdraw has no cast time, it auto-evades, and travels a fair distance in the process, in addition to removing all movement-based conditions. It’s also based on my facing, so the destination is 100% predictable. I can literally roll right through red circles and give zero kittens.

Yes, I thought it’s been obvious that I don’t use Pain Response because it is not worth it.

No, it’s obvious that you don’t use Pain Response because you apparently have no idea what it does. NOBODY who used PR would make the cooldown mistake that you did. Certainly they wouldn’t hand-wave the Regen like it didn’t exist, either.

Yes that is really bad knowing that your condition removal is wasted.

What was wasted? I just got Regen when I was injured. Condition removal can come from somewhere else. Obviously I would not be opposed to Assassin’s Reward removing conditions as well, but I can make do with the status quo.

And you choose to supplement the trait’s short coming with these? […] Seriously?

“Seriously” is not an argument, rebuttal, or anything resembling a valid response to what I just said there.

So “much of the time” those skills are just bench-warmers when you could’ve taken something more useful.

What skill is bench-warming? Shadowstep is a stun breaker and king mobility. Infiltrator’s is a lesser version but a signet passive. Signet of Agility is 8.5% passive crit chance and a free clear/refill for you an allies in a jam (and 5 stacks of might with a CS build). Lyssa and condi removal food aren’t actually skills, so I don’t know if you are cherry-picking here.

You see, the reason why this is a problem to you is because you refuse to see the value of stealth.

Baloney. I use and love stealth… when I am using a stealth build. Stealth is awesome if you are D/D or P/D in particular. But It doesn’t have any value for someone using S/P who never really stealths in the first place. I mean, sure, I’ll slot in Shadow Refuge if I need to sneak into a tower or bypass a zerg, but I’m not running around with it on my bar 100% of the time.

Am I getting this point across to you yet?

You seem to misunderstood what I wrote there.

I understood what you wrote, and rejected it. The point here is that your opinions need to be labeled as such: you have no business whatsoever making sweeping generalizations/proclamations about a build you don’t even have experience with. You’re making valuation judgments based upon your own misunderstandings.

You got this one backwards. 15pts into SA removes the necessity to dodge attacks. The reason you dodge attacks with Acro build is because even with your boon duration and larger health pool, you’re still taking more damage. The reduces damage from toughness and the increase in healing power traiting to SA is enough to ensure that dodging an attack is less necessary — meaning you are dealing more damage.

See above. Don’t ask me for my build and then ignore the stats.

The more you reply, the more it’s obvious that you have no concept of how Acrobatics spec Thieves actually fight.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Seriously? Hastened Replenishment? And that’s your problem. Instead of taking Sleight of Hand and Mug, you rely on Withdraw to heal you.

And this is a perfect example of what I am talking about. You just ignored two of the primary benefits of an Acrobatics build, because you don’t play it and thus have no concept of where your healing is even coming from.

Here’s what happens when I push Withdraw:

• I get A 4,344 heal that comes out instantly with no casting time whatsoever.
• It also has a 60% Healing Power ratio.
• Any immobilized, chilled, or crippled conditions are GONE.
• I immediately get a 0.75s auto-evade, and fly backwards relative to my facing (not my target, so it’s easy to control).
• I now have 6.5s of Vigor.
• OPTIONAL: I get a random boon for 13s from Lyssa, one of which can be Vigor (which is hilarious when it happens). Only Swiftness is really sub-par here.
• OPTIONAL: I get 4 init back.

You’re scratching your head wondering where the healing is coming from, meanwhile you’re ignoring the 13s of Regen from Pain Response and the post-skill healing from burning initiative with Assassin’s Reward. HR feeds AR.

Sleight of Hand is really good, and I run it often, but I don’t need it all the time. I’m not playing S/D, I’m playing S/P: that means that I have two interrupts on my skill bar. I also don’t need to rely on Steal for sustain, and can use it more tactically as a boon-ripper and shadowstep. Daze and a few seconds of recharge are not always better than 4 init for me.

Acrobatics is not an active playstyle because you rely on dodging as your main source of survival.

This is total nonsense. What’s inactive about dodging around? Is this literally not the definition of being active? On what universe is “active” a synonym for “I am dealing damage”? I’m perfectly fine with causing people to whiff long-cooldown moves, or re-position myself, or buy time waiting for cooldowns of my own.

You are really stretching now.

Arrow.4619:

Try again, and this time throw down something impressive (even if you have to make it up).

Please divert some of the time that you’d otherwise spend on playing GW2, to read a post that you are responding to. As far as I can tell, you have the time to spare. I’ll summarize for you:

1) NinjaEd accuses me of “having it out for Thieves”
2) I point out that I’ve been playing Thief since beta, more than any other class, and I’ll continue to play it. i.e., his accusation makes no sense.
3) You come in here with a non sequitur, and and insult that’s technically worth an infraction.

I think that you’re the one who needs to “try again”. This is not a contest. I am just establishing the fact that I did not just pick up Thief last week: I’ve been here for the whole ride. If you can’t come up with any response other than your /age, then don’t bother replying.

Better question is: Why don’t you tell us why you find it acceptable [..]

No. Steal has worked this way since release, and my argument is that it’s the status quo. If you don’t like it, the onus is on you to come up with a reason as to why it should change. I will ignore any and all attempts to deflect this back on to me.

Two of the other characters I play have roughly the same amount of in combat movement in two crucial areas: Actual movement in a combat situation (Asuran Greatsword/Scepter/Focus Guardian with Traveler Runes) [..]

You torpedoed your own argument the moment you said “Traveler’s”, which are 1) not common enough to be useful as a general solution, and 2) inferior to IMS, and 3) freeze out every other rune set combination. When a Guardian has to blow a king’s ransom and curtail other build options to get a worse result than a Thief when it comes to mobility, that’s a tell that Guardians are extremely mobility-constrained. Which they are.

As for DPS

I said “burst damage”. Circle back and try again.

Too bad too that they just nerfed vigor since you seem to think movement is so important. Must have annoyed you right when Anet did that? Or did you just “adjust” cause you’re in such a “good place”?

I have no problems with Vigor. I get plenty from VR and BT.

You point about “frontline fighters” is just silly.

I’d argue that you only think so because you don’t draw a distinction between a given amount of damage and the time that it takes to apply it, and also that you’re not allowing for something like stealth (which is non-combat time for the most part).

Compare the way a Guard/Warrior fights to the way that a Thief does. If you consider them comparable, we’re either talking waaaay too high level, or with far too specific builds.

Furious Retal has a 10s duration with 30s cooldown and only when target goes below 50%.

Thanks for the update, but I know how Furious Retaliation works. And it’s not 10s of fury for an Acrobatics build: is this the core of why you don’t value Acro, because you don’t understand how important boon duration is? I get 13s of Fury of out this trait, and it’s plenty helpful in large engagements because of the ease of hitting someone who is <50% health just by accident.

That boon duration also comes in really handy for Vigor, just saying.

Thrill gives you Fury every 10s if you spec SoH. So dropping Thrill for Long Reach is funny.

I don’t need Fury. I’d prefer to have Thrill, but my build does not crater if Fury access becomes more limited, because I have other ways to burst damage in a pinch (and generally have good crit rate anyway). Long Reach is really nice for certain kinds of tasks, so Retal allows me to slot it in without going totally dry on Fury.

This is called “being flexible”, and it’s super-useful.

I’m curious what’s the stats on your build.

I don’t have a “build”. I tweak things constantly. The core is Knight’s Armor with Lyssa runes and mostly Berserker’s weapons/trinkets, although I have a lot of ascended trinkets banked and tend to swap in things like PVT for specific purposes (rings mostly, because of random Fractal drops). Cavalier is probably strictly better, but the extra Precision is handy for Tolerance and the odd switch to a CS-heavy on-crit build.

But generally speaking I’m usually around 16-17k health, ~2400 Armor, and ~2000 Power minimum as a starting point. Crit chance and rate are all over the place because of variance in utilities and food.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

My point is, with that benefit from stealth, why don’t you carry at least one?

Because in order to benefit from stealth, I have to give up 15 points in Acrobatics and run Hide in Shadows as my heal. HiS has a 30-second cooldown, and isn’t suitable for a build that never fights from stealth in the first place. Why in Tyria would I give up a 15s Withdraw heal on a build that’s running Vigorous Recovery? Especially since I could also have Lyssa runes (for the #4 ability), or be using Hastened Replenishment?

It just doesn’t make any kitten ed sense. If I’m not running HiS, I’m giving up a utility slot for stealth, which is (somehow) even worse. Acrobatics is an active playstyle: you either want to be fighting, running, or dead.

Eh? So you go in stealth and not move? o.O?

You don’t always have the freedom to avoid AOEs or no-target skills. Breaking LOS doesn’t mean that you’re playing against an idiot. Stealth offers no protection from these things if someone can guess where you are, or if you don’t actually have a lot of places to move to.

Hmm, you’re right. Not sure where I got that 60s. I stand corrected.

It’s worth noting here that this illustrates the difference between someone who plays a spec in real life, and someone who only plays it on paper. You would have never made this mistake if you actually used Pain Response yourself on a regular basis: I constantly have Regen for long durations of time because of trait.

That much is true, I agree. However it suffers from not being able to control Pain Response. […] it’s not a good game play to lose control of your Thief.

You don’t “suffer” from getting 12+ seconds of Regeneration when someone hits you. The worst case scenario for this trait is that it activates with no conditions and heals you for 1600+ over 12 seconds or more. Worst case! The best case scenario is when it removes all three conditions at the same time, and the average case is that you generally will be under the effects of one of them (bleed, burning, poison are very common).

Since this is merely a trait, you just need to have cover condition removal to slot in for the worst case (conditions applied while PR is on cooldown). an Acrobatics Thief is not running stealths, so this can be any or all of:

- Shadowstep
- Lyssa #6 (Basilisk Venom or Dagger Storm)
- Signet of Agility
- Infiltrator’s Return
- Condi removal on heal from food

One of those even does extra duty as a stun breaker and a mobility enhancer. Signet of Agility can give you a condi removal PLUS refilled endurance, PLUS 5 stacks of Might. If you are lacking backups for Pain Response, it’s User Error, i.e. your build has a problem.

Remember: much of the time, Pain Response makes these things unnecessary.

How so? 30pts in Trick gives me a lot of mobility to sustain a non-single person engagement. Just to be clear, I main S/D set.

The problem comes when you get into long engagements where health is the factor rather than evades. It happens in situations with focus fire, unavoidable AOE damage, inability to disengage (such as during a siege), etc. Mug and a long-cooldown healing skill are not necessarily sufficient.

I apologize.

Apology accepted. In the future, please understand that there is a difference between 1) your best practices, and 2) actual best practices. You can stay out of trouble if you label your opinions as opinions, and avoid making sweeping generalizations about playstyles that you are clearly not familiar with.

I guess Thieves has less chance of survival when going into stealth that’s why you don’t pick up at least one stealth skill. You don’t have to be a stealther to use stealth.

You have to be a stealther to use stealth as your primary survival mechanic. A build predicated on condition removal and healing during stealth needs ways to get there. A build designed around staying in combat and hitting people isn’t going to want to spend 15 points on a trait line that they can’t effectively leverage without unraveling their core style.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Stealth is a defensive mechanism to prevent re-application of targeted conditions and targeted damage for as least the duration of the stealth.

Am I speaking a different language, here? Stealth-based survival is not useful to people who cannot stealth. I have no stealths on my bar whatsoever. I can combo Black Powder and Cluster bomb if I really wanted to, that’s about it.

Never mind that stealth is highly vulnerable to AOEs and non-targeted damage + conditions.

HiS gives you a higher effective health. Pain Response has a horrible cooldown of 60s, HiS has 30s cooldown meaning you can remove conditions more often on top of a high healing on use.

Update your notes: Pain Response has a 30s cooldown, not 60s. Also, Pain Response has a long-duration Regeneration on it (10s vs. 4s). While HiS has a burst heal on it, Pain Response is not a Healing skill. PR lets you run something like Withdraw or Signet of Malice, which are superior heals to HiS past 15 seconds. Withdraw also throws in things like Vigorous Recovery, and the #4 skill on Lyssa.

Also Pain Response triggers and goes into cooldown even if you don’t need it just because you drop down to 75% health. :/

If I am under 75% health, I’m pretty sure that I could use a 12+ second regen.

Not 25 pts, only 15. Since I spec 30 in Trick, I already have 10 in DA for Mug. So that 15 pts can either go in DA for more damage or in Acro for mediocre damage.

But I don’t go down 10 DA all the time, so it’d be 25 points for me. And since I run 25-30 Acrobatics and you don’t, that seems like an important difference.

25/0/0/15/30 is for sustain engagement. Not sure what you’re talking about here.

I’m talking about the part of the game where you’re not dueling a single person, and the sustain in 25/0/0/15/30 not equal to the task.

No. It’s not worth it when you do the comparison of benefits. You have to ask yourself what you get for every point your put into a trait.

Who is “you” and “yourself” in your example? It’s you. Not me, not the generic thief, but you personally.

Then you’re not in need of survival because SA has the best survival traits.

Only if you are a stealther. If I have no stealths on my bar, than 30 SA is kind of a hilarious waste unless I’m using venoms, because there’s no survival there for me. Except Last Refuge, I guess?

What do you pick in 10 CS? Furious Retal? If so, you already have access to Fury with 10 Trick that can be triggered every 21s (or less).

Whatever I need at the moment.

- Furious Retaliation: 100% Fury uptime (Thrill is not enough for this by itself). Also allows me to drop Thrill for Long Reach without running totally dry on Fury access.
- Practiced Tolerance: 1300-1500+ health for an Adept skill is a pretty good deal.
- Signets of Power: if I am running a couple signets or more, this is 5 stacks of 13s+ Might on activation. A really good way to get Power in a hurry. Helps a lot for ones that I am using anyway, like Infiltrator’s.

And obviously besides the Adept skill, you also get the Precision/crit and Keen Observer.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

But we’re talking about survivability so in comparison, we have better chance of survival with SA than with Acro. Even if you don’t use stealth, having Hide in Shadow to remove 4 conditions is a plus when it comes to survival.

Nope.

Pain Response in 20 Acrobatics gives you similar condition protection at around the same rate, but it’s automatic and doesn’t require that you pick a bad healing skill. Someone with 20+ Acrobatics has a counter-measure for bleed/poison/burning (and a much longer Regen buff), but is still able to run Signet of Malice or Withdraw for far superior healing/utility.

HiS buys you a bonus condition. That’s cool. But worse than Acrobatics for the non-stealth Thief. If you don’t really benefit from stealth, and don’t even have something like Hidden Assassin for synergy, what’s the point?

I’m addressing the benefit of taking Fluid Strikes (25 Acro)in comparison to taking Exposed Weakness (25 DA). I concluded that it’s more beneficial to take 25 DA than 25 Acro, meaning, there’s no reason to go pass 15 points in Acro.

If we’re stipulating that you’re putting 15 into Acrobatics regardless, Fluid Strikes only costs 10 more points than your sunk cost. Exposed Weakness requires that you spend 25 points in Deadly Arts.

Anyone can use a hyperbole when they have ran out of counter-arguments.

It’s a true story. I have run 25/0/0/15/30 before, and you cannot survive sustained engagements to the extent that you can with a more Acrobatics-centric setup. I have to use builds that allow me to do the things that I want to do.

Nobody is dictating how the class should be played, we are merely having a discussion whether 30pts in Acro is a good idea. I’ve shown by comparison that there’s no benefit to go pass 15pts, that the 15pts can be used somewhere else with more benefit.

In other words, that it’s not worth it to you. But nobody ever says “that’s not worth it for me”, because that doesn’t sound as cool; they have to try to make some broader point that doesn’t doesn’t necessarily apply.

For damage, add the 15 pts in DA. For survival, add the 15pts in SA.

I’d be out of my mind to put 15 points in SA. There isn’t a single stealth on my bar. What is the point?

I’m not sure where else do you put your points in if you don’t have at least 10pts in DA for Mug. :/

Mug seems to be an obvious choice if you spec Trickery.

Mug is very good, and I sometimes run 10 DA, but it’s not the be-all end-all. 10 CS is also strong, even though it doesn’t synergize with Steal.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

If I would focus on survivability, the right choice would be SA and not Acro. You get more for your 15 points in SA than going all the way to 30pts Acro.

Shadow Arts isn’t really that useful for people who don’t stealth or use venoms. You’ll get Toughness and some Healing Power, along with an Adept skill that’s OK-ish. Acrobatics is better if you’re mostly being active in combat.

Fluid Strikes is interchangeable with Exposed Weakness, but with Fluid Strikes, you don’t get the Power boost and condition duration from DA which synegized well with Exposed Weakness.

It’s not clear here what this has to do with survival. Nobody is calling Acrobatics an offensive trait line, but there is an offensive trait past the 15 that you’ve already invested in it.

Yes, but spec-ing for 30 Acro is a really bad trade off.

Says you. Not a week ago I was grinding out a Garrison capture against superior numbers, and there were AOEs flying around everywhere with nary a place to hide. I’d have gotten pasted across the floor like a booger if I’d been running your trait configuration. This is just a matter of opinion, naturally, but I feel like I contribute more when I’m alive.

I don’t disparage the glassy thieves their delicious cake, but let’s not pretend that there’s only one way to play the class.

5pts into DA will make your Steal deal ~1140 poison damage instead of the base 840 damage.

It also lets you do more damage when you have a Venomshare Thief in your group, or a Guardian, and it helps with shortbow conditions, and assorted other things that I care very little for. I’d prefer to take literally any other stat over condition damage, including Healing Power, but I spec Trickery anyway because I want what’s at GM. C’est la vie.

NinjaEd.3946:

Interceptor, you seem to have it out for thieves on your agenda rather than seeing the picture painted before you.

Spare me. I’m a career Thief: been playing since beta, I have 700+ hours logged on just Thief alone, probably will have several hundred more in my future. Played every build except S/D (missed the meta when it was good), played every mode except sPvP.

I like this class, I think it’s in a good place. You and others are making silly arguments with made-up criteria.

Also I agree with arrow on the fact that something like steal not being universal is wrong. Profession mechanics no matter how small they may be, should at their base be useful.

Well, sign up for his newsletter. But before that, tell me why it should be that way, a reason other than 1) you want it to be or 2) “fairness”.

We can hit hard, but have you seen recent guardian builds in spvp/tpvp?

Fun fact: I play a Guardian. If you’ve ever wondered why I comment on every Thief vs. Guardian comparison, that’s why. Guards are not bursty in the same way that Thieves are, generally speaking.

[…] you’re comparing 2 completely different classes based on playstyle not effectiveness in combat.

I like to see it as “pointing out the obvious advantages of Thief that people always take for granted”. Some people here have no idea how much Guardians drool over Thief mobility, or how they wish that they had some credible way to deal real condition damage.

My problems lie in base steal which unless traited isn’t all that great while other professions don’t have that issue.

Not only do I think this is a poor metric to be judging things by, but I don’t even agree with you. Steal is better than people care to admit, and Virtues are not as good as people think that they are.

I’d like to see an army of condi-spec D/D Venomshare Thieves, back-flipping for justice.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

That’s the thing, it’s not worth it trying to build around it.

I’m currently running a 25-0-0-15-30 because there’s not enough reason to go beyond 15 in Acrobat.

That’s just a choice that you’ve made. It’s not that Acrobatics doesn’t provide anything, it’s that you don’t like it. Going past Feline Grace to 30 Acro gives you another 1500 health, 15% boon duration, Fluid Strikes, and a pair of Master/GM traits (which include Pain Response and Quick Pockets, if you don’t like AR). It certainly makes you more survivable than 15 points in either DA or Trickery.

Builds always involve trade-offs. I go 30 Trickery too, even though I might as well be lighting the 300 condition damage on fire for all the good that it does me overall.

NinjaEd.3946:

True, but thief also shares the same life pool tier and has medium armor, and much less regen/burst heals. Their best heals are withdraw and shadow’s rejuvenation and that hardly makes up for aegis and constant regen/vigor. With a 30 point investment thief can barely maintain perma vigor assuming steal never missed but ppl are human, and they will from time to time. Guardian and Mesmer only require a 5 point investment to get the same thing and unless you get chain cc, you aren’t likely to miss that crit. Add boon duration and its even easier to keep it up.

Thief also stomps all over Guardians in terms of:

- Burst damage
- Mobility
- Damaging conditions
- Soft CC

And I didn’t say win, I said stomp. These classes are not even on the same planet in terms of those listed things. So let’s be holistic with our class comparisons, please.

Arrow.4619:

What did the thief in your opinion get for “giving up” health? What “direct relationship” bonus did the thief get?

Thief was never intended to be a frontline bruiser in the first place. Guardians with their innate class survival AND Warrior/Necro-level health pools would be bonkers; that’s why they didn’t get it.

Thieves have king mobility (mostly from shadow steps) and stealth. As it happens, you can get both of those things from our class mechanic, but that’s probably just a coincidence. Honest.

First, they shouldn’t be balanced against one another they should be generally beneficial to the class in and of themselves on regular, reliable ongoing basis. Tell me exactly how does Steal meet that criteria?

A better question: why does Steal have to meet your made-up criteria for a class skill?

Why should one class have a class mechanic with dubious benefits when every other class gets a genuinely consistently, beneficial class mechanic? Simple fairness to the players of all classes would suggest it should.

Sorry, what’s not beneficial about shadow steps, Steal, long-duration stealth, and no-cooldown weapon utility? PS: just because you can find some things that you don’t like about it, doesn’t mean it’s not beneficial.

Arrow.4619:

And we pay for Steal by being tossed into the bottom rung in spite of our role as a hand-to-hand combatant?

This is nonsense. Guardians gave up health pool in trade for sustainability and damage mitigation. It’s a direct relationship: their overall tankiness on both ends.

Have to disagree: Its never time to stop making cross-class comparisons since those comparisons allow you to determine what the characteristics are for a reasonable class mechanic.

Then give some iota of a reason why class mechanics should be balanced against each other, other than the fact that you want them to be. Classes are balanced against each other.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

I guess if you really want to do it, you surely can — but that’s a good way to waste resources to purchase ascended items. The significant loss of damage output just to make a crappy trait to work to me is not worth it — because we all know, in a couple of months or so, Anet will nerf Thieves again and leave you out to dry because Anet wants Thieves to die as soon as we show ourselves.

You have to give up something to get something. Acrobatics may not pair well with Shadow Arts, but Trickery is definitely in play, and you can get +3 to max init and 2/4 init on steal/heal, depending on how far you go. It doesn’t lend itself to super wombo-combo damage, but does anyone going down the Acrobatics line ever do that anyway? Acro is not a high-damage line in the first place: you have Fluid Strikes and PoI, and that’s about all she wrote.

Use exotic if you prefer; the stat drop-off is not huge.

foste.3098:

Increase the health you get per initiative spent (maybe to 75 or so), since if you go 30 in acrobatics you most likely won’t go for shadow arts and so you don’t get extra healing from healing power (since thiefs don’t generally take gear with healing power).

I’d like the base heal to be increased as well, but nobody is stopping you from taking some Healing Power. A couple pieces of Cleric’s or Magi’s are both perfectly defensible for a 30 Acrobatics spec. Two ascended rings with major HP gives you a substantial boost to the healing on AR.

Guardians pay for their Virtues by being tossed into the bottom rung of health pools, in spite of their role as a heavy armor frontliner. Virtue of Resolve’s sustain combined with the Aegis from Justice, is literally the reason for this particular configuration. That’s the price of being good out of the box.

It’s 2014 now, and it’s time to stop making direct cross-class comparisons. Steal may be problematic, but it not because of what some other class got. Personally, I think that Steal is in a pretty good spot, all things considered.

TheGuy.3568:

1). If your current build were nerfed would you leave the class?

No. I’m on my umpteenth build since beta. If I couldn’t make my current build work, I’d just switch to another one.

2). How much of a nerf would it have to be (scaling slightly reduce effectiveness to completely break the build)?

It’d have to either be a large nerf to damage (maybe Pistol Whip replaced with Water Pistol), or small nerfs to multiple things at once (dodging, healing, damage, utility of trait lines) to break the thing.

3).Would it matter if the nerf was Spvp only, or WvW only?

If it was sPvP only, I wouldn’t care. If it was WvW only, I’d still keep it around for PvE.

4). Would it matter if the nerf can with a buff?

Depends. The nerf to various things in the Dec 10th patch also came with buffs (init regain, Pistol Whip aftercast) that arguably made the build better than it was before.

5). What type of nerf would most likely get you to leave the class ie stealth, evasion, burst dps, sustained dps, condi damage, etc.?

If they axe evasion, I am probably done with Thief. It’s very nearly the last universally-useful defensive mechanic that we have left. Stealth depends on the details (I currently do not use stealth anyway), DPS is too vague, and I’m not much for condition damage builds. I’d probably also consider pulling the ripcord if they nerfed Shadowstep (the mechanic, not the utility).

^ I’ve been experimenting with a x/x/x/30/30 build on S/P since you mentioned it in another thread, +1 to what you’ve said here. I run Lyssa runes, though: excellent synergy on Withdraw, and the #6 slot ability helps with condition-bombers and other various things.

frans.8092:

P/D condition build with caltrops and a bit of Choking Gas will work almost as fast as D/D. But you cannot mix D/D and P/D very well as one is a Power/Crit setup and the other a Condition. You could try Carrion but both will suffer. Dealing with mostly player escorts, I’d go Dire and focus on p/d condition.

I’d advise against trying to kill escorted Dolyaks with conditions in WvW. While it’s hilarious to kill a yak while stealthed with Caltrops and Choking Gas, if the escort has any healing and condition clear (like a Ranger, for instance) they will be able to keep the yak alive through your shenanigans.

Best bet is a high-mobility burst build, and feel free to sacrifice the mobility for more burst if you don’t care about dying. Trading a death for a yak is not necessarily a bad thing if you are trying to deny a resupply.

^ There is basically no supporting your assertion that PvE Thief hasn’t been nerfed in over a year. You ought to walk that one back if you want to have your opinion taken seriously.

NinjaEd.3946:

Interceptor, you forgot […]

I forgot nothing. Don’t address me if you’re not going to address my post. All I did was point out that Arganthium’s statement:

“The daze is extremely short anyways, and is only good as pretty much the game’s only counter to stability stomping […]”

… was nonsense. I’m not advocating 30 Trickery for sPvP, just setting the record straight on Sleight of Hand (and its interaction with Bountiful Theft). Fin. Argue with someone else about optimal builds, please.

Arganthium.5638:

The daze is extremely short anyways, and is only good as pretty much the game’s only counter to stability stomping (outside of just trying to do lots of damage or trying to move away with, for example, Thief down state #2).

In other words, the Daze isn’t useful if you have no idea what you’re doing, but you could say that for a lot of other skills.

In reality, attaching a guaranteed interrupt to something you can do whenever, instantly, is actually kind of ridiculous. There’s no counterplay for it, and the interrupt puts the skill on a significant CD. Even if you don’t score the interrupt, a 1 second Daze is nothing to scoff at, and puts you in an advantageous position if you have the ability to follow-up with another control effect when it wears off.

Aegis is a pretty crappy boon, especially when you just get it thrown onto you.

Crappy compared to ascension to godhood perhaps, but compared to other boon strip options it’s a pretty good one, since that’s one fewer thing that can stuff your next attack. I’ll take an Aegis any day; doesn’t protect you from multi-hits, but it’s just as frustrating on a Thief as it is anyone else.