@ Sir Vincent :
Hidden thief would hamper with my playstyle – I usually CnD and steal – which I can’t really anymore anyway due to the passive invulnerabilities of other classes and due to a game change they made a year ago (Lunar Festival) – since then CnD misses more often than it hits – I don’t think they’ve noticed this, so I don’t think it’ll ever be changed.
I also don’t really need more initative. This would all again favour D/P. = It is really hard to balance classes in themselves and against other classes with the trait system as it is now.
@ Sir Vincent :
Yeah, it’s no matter how you turn it; it will never work out.
I only heard about that the warrior warhorn skills have been deleted from the traits, so no one uses warhorn anymore = that set is dead. It’s not about “build diversity” in regards to people taking a build like 24422, it’s build restriction regarding weapons. And that has got to be laziness, it must’ve been clear when they merged the traits that certain weapons use the traits. So, you can put the most important traits back on weapons but still, due to the merge, people are forced to play a certain way. I can’t take the falling trait as a D/P thief if I’m serious (I can switch – but I can’t do that mid fight) – so I’m restricted in my playstyle (that trait can be really good).
What they’ve done with the sloppy handeling of the redesign is restricting their own game to only a handful of classes/builds and they created a massive powercreep due to all the passives now being availlable/merged in the traits. I don’t see how they’ll get out of this.
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Sir Vincent: Yes, I know (baseline/minor) – problem is to create traits and to put them somewhere where all thieves have access to them. So basically; I’d rather have single traits again so people aren’t forced to take a for them useless second one which is merged with it. But I don’t think this really works with the 3 per bracket and then with everything put into traits. I’ll think about it some more.
Lettuce: My comment directed to you was about as relevant as yours to me and what Sir Vincent meant was if you duel me and lose, what does that prove? That D/D is fine or that I’m skilled? If I’m using D/P = that D/P is “OP” (in comparison to other sets) or that I’m skilled? = a duel has got no use. I can tell you I killed two D/P thieves today (in wvw) but the game is broken, so I don’t put that down to skill.
Spread Cheese: I came to the conclusion that the game is going to stay like it is for at least another year – no matter what I say here, how good I argue. So yes, I should either uninstall or reroll.
ETA: Because what anet have to do to bring thief, and probably all classes, back on track is to revert to the old trait system.
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D/D is the easiest weaponset to use mechanically of all the physical melee sets. The problem is anet has made thief’s effectiveness directly tied to mechanical difficulty of the set while the rest of the game’s classes do not abide by this rule.
Now before all the DD users in this thread come for blood let me clarify MECHANICALLY EASY. This is not mean easy to be effective, but says the total effectiveness drops significantly as skill level increases. This is how games are supposed to work btw.
Thank you
I disagree as the range is too short, the animation duration too long, players too mobile and the initative costs too high.
So yes, in a vacuum CnD is really easy.Once again you demonstrate the fine art of not comprehending what you’ve just read.
MECHANICAL SKILL
This is in reference to how many keystrokes are needed to play the weaponset. Also it delves into the land of hitting the correct button in response to what you are seeing.
I’m sorry but DD does not require much of that compared to the other sets. In fact I would put SP above DD in terms off mechanical skill.
Yes we all know DD has range issues….but kitten it’s a melee set.
So I’m curious as to which animation on DD is too long?
Alright, so I see – you refuse to get the point – thanks for proving it =)
So guys. I don’t know why you’re feeding into the delusions of a below average thief aka Jana. Just end thread and move on. This guy isn’t in any position to even suggest thief changes considering his skill level.
You wish =) Btw I’m a gal as stated in the first sentence of the OP.
One question though: Why does apperantly no one get that “Jana” is a female name – it baffles me. It usually takes people on my servers ages to get that I’m a “girl”.
D/D is the easiest weaponset to use mechanically of all the physical melee sets. The problem is anet has made thief’s effectiveness directly tied to mechanical difficulty of the set while the rest of the game’s classes do not abide by this rule.
Now before all the DD users in this thread come for blood let me clarify MECHANICALLY EASY. This is not mean easy to be effective, but says the total effectiveness drops significantly as skill level increases. This is how games are supposed to work btw.
Thank you
I disagree as the range is too short, the animation duration too long, players too mobile and the initative costs too high.
So yes, in a vacuum CnD is really easy.
So what your saying is the best thief in PvP could compete against the non best necros, scrappers, eles, mesmers, DHs, etc only because he used DP, AND that means we need to nerf DP instead of buff the other sets? So what would happen if he went up against the best of other classes? Yeah thanks for proving that this thread is a joke.
Btw who is this best thief lol
You are a joke as all you want is to stir things up to get attention. I don’t know whats up with all of you today/tonight – was there something in your water?
But like already said by not only me: Read the thread – it’s probably enough if you read the newly merged OP. I don’t think you’ve learned anything about thief in the meantime, so you probably won’t understand what exactly the point of this thread is, so to you it will all be pointless and an utter joke.
My buddy forwarded me a video of a D/P thief and said “you’ll like it, the best pvp thief” I wrote “the best” = I have no clue if he really is but his play was really good. But I forgot his name and since he was D/P anyway I didn’t care too much.
ETA: Please try to get this: D/P has got all utility most if not all thieves want to have. All other sets had to trait for it. These traits have mostly been deleted or put together in a way no one can take the traits they “need” anymore. Even if you buff OH dagger D/P will be the strongest set – and all sets would “taste” alike = no real diversity. Also not every set needs the exact same utility; a S/D thief likely couldn’t care less about blind on CnD, to me it’s crucial, D/P has it on the set anyway. As long D/P is the strongest set (which it likely will always be as they don’t have to trait for their utility) it will be the most played set and get the most attention. And since its the strongest link in our fragile class it was only that when D/P (which is pretty much indestructible) wasn’t viable anymore that anet did something (one can argue whether or not that was the right thing) – but it all only really suited D/P. So what anet should do is delete everything but staff, SB and D/P – if that is your idea of balance, then yes I know nothing about balance.
But : I found that my ideas of putting most of the utility on traits won’t work with the “3 traits to chose from in each bracket” – so I guess this will be just as the botched former trait aquisition thingy – it will be kept like it is until they redesign the game in a year or so – and we won’t hear anything in the meantime. They’ll probably wonder why no one really plays their game anymore, though.
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In general: I think toning down SS/buffing OH dagger, unmerging the traits and making some traits baseline or minors, and by that I mean traits all thieves take, would be the way to go to get all thief sets in line again. I thought it would be the either one or other way, but I guess it doesn’t work without altering everything.
We have too few trait slots to match both sets and personal playstyles, using them to restrict one weapon set would further restrict another set or playstyle.
This is something I only found yesterday/today.
Anet could however add another few traits to chose from, but as long as traits are merged there would have to be several copies of the same traits in different combinations to do justice to the different sets and/or playstyles.
Explanation to the latter: “we want D/P to take this trait, so we put this and that in here, and we want D/D to take that in the same bracket, so they get this and that” but some people might want trait x of D/P and y of D/D – so easiest really might be to make no real set specific traits and that means the weapons have to be buffed – I guess there’s no way around it.
ETA²: I do think restricting sets with traits was a smart thing to do but the current design doesn’t leave much room. With that (my idea) D/P still would be the strongest set, except if the traits were redesigned really smartly – but that would likely take too much effort.
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And yet you never said “in my opinion”. Which was my point.
No single skill roots you, they’re all fluid. To me that is mobility – to most other people it’s probably really moving from a to z.
No? First quote directed at you. “To me = In my opinion”, btw.
My point exactly. To me
<<-!!
not coming up with an intelligible reply or being able to discuss this as adults
It is my opinion – I don’t need to discuss my opinion and in most cases it’s useless to discuss an opinion that’s based on a feeling. And you’re acting like a child having an epic meltdown right now.
I did claim the set is easy. I made the claim the set is easy and over-performs almost entirely because of Shadow Shot’s damage. I did not claim the set was “easy” for any other reason at this time, and base my solution on adjustments to reduce the skill floor and maintain the skill ceiling of the weapon set/class. I identified the problem, argued my stance on why I have such perceptions, and proposed a solution.
As did I – your problem right now is that you chose to have a meltdown and make problems out of nothing.
See, if arguing on the premise of “easy”, it is only proper to assure that the one making claims is arguing other combinations are “easy” whilst setting his basis for comparison at the highest possible difficulty point within reasonable context; for then subjective balance ideology of what constitutes “easier” becomes more objective than any arbitrary location on the scale of ease-of-use relative to potency as studied through metric data and what can be observed on the design-level. My point is, the basis for your insults rests on flawed logic and hypocrisy.
I would answer in German as you’d probably understand as much of my answer as I did of yours. So, why am I a Hypocrite now? Simple English, please.
ETA: I’m still here for a bit, if you want our conversation deleted just say it.
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If you find D/P easy then I congratulate you. I see a lot, I mean a lot, of bad thieves and frankly I’m one of them. The amount of AoE alone makes thief (of any stripe) challenging for me. Having said that, I enjoy the challenge.
D/P is the easiest set thief has got.. If you already know thief then D/P shouldn’t be a problem for you.
If you’re trying to recruit for [Teef], it’s a poor job lass. Getting to know thief is a job in and of itself. But keep on posting, no skin off my back.
And I never said D/P wasn’t the easiest weapon set. That much has proven over and over.
If you find D/P easy then I congratulate you.
And I never said D/P wasn’t the easiest weapon set.
And your point is? That you hate me?
That I should write an essay about how to play thief?
Or are you simply ***hurt that you can’t pull D/P off? There’s some videos out there of people playing D/P – helped me a lot with D/D. Thief itself is still a pretty broken class, no matter what – but it doesn’t help if the only set kept alive is D/P (and staff because of HoT). That’s the point.
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umm….
“I do have issues with your willingness to play martyr and then immediately proclaim yourself as being above certain subjects and argue subjects which you suit to your agenda, refuse mistakes, twist words, and call names in a completely hypocritical manner.”
“In my opinion D/D is the most mobile set as none of the skills is rooted”
“YOU’RE A LIAR YOU’RE PLAYING MARTYR RAGE RAGE RAGE!!!!”
Are you sure you’re fine?
Also, you yourself said D/P was easy and it is – it’s actually a no brainer and I don’t want to discuss it again.
To make it simple: Shut up =)
ETA: In this thread I already wrote “D/P is no easy way to play GW, but it’s the easy way to play thief” The person I was referring to said they had experience in S/D, so what I wrote was: “If you have already played thief (S/D), then D/P should be no problem for you.”
What my intention with this thread was: Make all thief sets more or less equal. As long as everything is catered to suit D/P none of the other sets will be. And you’re the one calling for everything to be nerfed as it doesn’t “require enough skill”. So: let go, yes?
ETA²: Because I’m pretty bummed: It is my opinion that D/D is the most mobile set there is – I don’t need to discuss that. I accept that other people have got an other opinion – I already did – I just didn’t accept your arguments for that – that doesn’t make me “PLAYING THE MARTYR TWISTING WORDS CHANGING FACTS!!!” I simply disagree with you – deal with it. And this is a kitten non issue!
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If you find D/P easy then I congratulate you. I see a lot, I mean a lot, of bad thieves and frankly I’m one of them. The amount of AoE alone makes thief (of any stripe) challenging for me. Having said that, I enjoy the challenge.
D/P is the easiest set thief has got.. If you already know thief then D/P shouldn’t be a problem for you.
I just want to see multiple viable weapon sets. Reverting S/D to where it was about 18 months ago, changing P/P #2 to something more useful, and leaving D/P where it is at would improve my mood.
Also, the only pistol trait is still lame.
It takes really good players to make D/P seem powerful (as I’m learning). Most of us are not that good to be honest.
Not really, it’s pretty easy, although I watched “the best” thief in pvp the other day and his timing was pretty godlike. He wouldn’t have that much success with another set – and that is sad and one of the points.
Death Blossom also forces a movement pattern
No, only thing is you fly through the air, you can stir which direction you want it to be. If you use S/D #3 and want to go forward you first have to swerve to the side..
plus FS can be used in stealth
So I can’t use DB in stealth – good to know.
Mobility is not uniformly defined by casting speeds and roots. Doing so would be ridiculous and would be a blatant lie.
So, I lie when I say “to me D/D is the most mobile set in this game” ok then.
“I like cookies” “That’s a lie!!”
No offense, but you really have issues – let go.
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I read the thread and laughed a lot,while doing so I might add. What I found is a bunch a WvW SA D/D thieves are lobbying to nerf DP so they can kill them while secretly hoping anet then buffs D/D to compensate for the destruction of thief viability.
I’m giving y’all a second chance to redeem yourselves
Do you want to contribute to this thread or haven’t you gotten enough attention elsewhere today that’s why you need to come here and be rude so someone talks to you?
By that logic P/D is an incredibly mobile set because none of the abilities root you in place.
Yes and no – it doesn’t have DB.
S/D also doesn’t have any skills which root the player
You’re still bound to move in a certain way when using your #3.
and has more seamless and fluid animations on its skills than D/D does. Actually, Death Blossom’s movement/animation is slower than Flanking Strike’s, and S/D also offers better travel speed, gap opening AND closing, and fight reset potential.
I thought we agreed on the movement, yet you talk again about gap closers :P. The animation of DB might be marginally slower – I don’t think anyone is able to really see that.
So I’m really not seeing your point here.
That’s ok, as I stated my opinion.
Please elaborate. In my three and a half years of playing D/D I have found the set to be extremely poor in its mobility.
S/D packs so much more in-combat mobility that I don’t even run shortbow and use it as my second set because D/D lacks it so much.
No single skill roots you, they’re all fluid. To me that is mobility – to most other people it’s probably really moving from a to z.
So let’s look at the grand scheme of things.
Lets say the vocal minority here who do not understand balance succeed and get DP nerfed to DD levels….what do you think the thief class will be after that? Please tell us what you think will happen from there.
The vocal minority that knows nothing about thief is you – we already had that. If you want to know the “grand scheme of things” read the thread – a lot of great thoughts in here.
And btw: If I were interested in other classes (thus know them) I would probably do the same on their forums as the non existent diversity sucks.
I guess constantly moving to your target’s flank during combat does not qualify as mobility — I love S/D for this reason too.
No single skill roots you, they’re all fluid. To me that is mobility – to most other people it’s probably really moving from a to z.
D/D: In fight though there’s nothing more mobile than that set.
whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?
Surprising, eh?
I think after 2 years of D/D and 14 chars (of which 5 are D/D thieves) I can really say that. Reason why I fell in love with thief, especially D/D.
Edit: Spelling
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D/D isn’t justifiably mobile outside of HS spam, which is just MH dagger, and D/P offers better in-combat mobility from Shadow Shot. S/x is more mobile so long as there’s a target, and obviously shortbow is mobility king.
The only sets D/D is more mobile than are P/D and P/P, which are the worst for obvious reasons being that neither of these have a gap close or OOC movement abilities.
D/D doesn’t have to sit in a smokefield
All that matters with D/D is your own moves.
ETA²: So yes if people mean “running from a to z”, then D/D isn’t mobile. In fight though there’s nothing more mobile than that set.
That’s actually one of the problems. The solution that ArenaNet comes up with not only helps D/D but also D/P. So in the end, the gap between D/P and the other sets are ever growing wider. To keep D/P in check, it needs to be nerfed.
Yes and no, right now at least the traits in SA favour only D/P – they’re merged in a way which doesn’t really benefit D/D – as both sets have got a different playstyle.
ETA: Prepardness only really helps D/P.
ETA³: But I do want unblockable on CnD – I really can’t with all these passives flying around. And I want it without having to take BV (cast too long and I love my daggerstorm which is of more use to me anyway as I never know if my next fight will be a 1 vs 1 (haha), vs 5 or vs zerg).
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Look, you can say I don’t know D/D. It hasn’t been in the meta for ages and I haven’t bothered with it beyond playing it enough to learn that it’s immobile.
It’s actually the most mobile set thief has, apart from that it hasn’t got a build in shadowstep – and yes, if you don’t know the set then why are you calling me wrong and said I “got trapped in your trap card” kind of silly, isn’kitten
And sorry, Drayos, but I really can’t with “ur enlizh”.
Oh, and btw – I am a wvw player I have no other role than to kill.
See this is where I would say “YOU’VE JUST ACTIVATED MY TRAP CARD” if I was the extravagantly-haired protagonist of an anime focused around card games.
Again this is just being pedantic. Since I think D/P and D/D were equally buffed, and in the end there’s only two D/X weaponsets so you could say one benefiting more than the other is like the flip of a coin. But…
If you think so you don’t know either of the sets. So which trap did I activate – do you really think you emerged as top dog right now?
The trait buffs were to Acro/CS/SA. D/P uses none of these. Even the Shadow Shot bugfix was in CS which D/P doesn’t use.
Not so sure about that actually and even if D/P doesn’t use it – a lot of the traits are only of use to D/P and no other set – and that’s the point.
Ok, so on the rest we partly agree – and if you think a bit further you’ll hopefully get my point – we have 6 sets, 8 weapons and everything is tailored to match one, maybe 2, the third is able to pick some cherries here and there.
No one used S/D anymore, so I guess it wasn’t working that fine.
And again: I guess we’re not the only class with this problem – the traitline merge kicked probably a lot of sets all around because no one thought of the use the traits had. So, we have now a fraction of the classes/sets we used to have. But hey, we have elites, right?
Again, I already wrote it: The traits are merged in a way I can’t benefit of them. How they’re now (in SA) only D/P can make use of them. So even if CnD were buffed the trait dilemma remains.
How I would redesign SA: SE minor, 50% speed increase minor, either might again (it did make sense) or Meld with Shadows minor.
Adepts : Last refuge, Merciful ambush, concealed defeat (although I’m pretty certain no one would ever use it anyway)
Master : Hidden thief, leeching venoms, CiS
Grandmaster : SRej, Resillence of Shadows (buffed to 50% again), Venomous Aura
2 Traits are missing: The falling damage trait and Shadow protector – both could be made baseline or put together with CiS still and Hidden Thief.
But I’m not too happy with this. The idea is to make offhand dagger viable again, not taking too much from DP and let those who want to play a support role do their thing without having every thief pressed into that role.
ETA²: Yes, that wouldn’t be a nerf to D/P, but a buff for every thief, especially P/D and D/D.
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Thief as a whole is finally in an ok place after being shoved out of the meta since the specialization update last summer, and rather than seek to help d/d be brought up to the level of d/p you’d rather the whole profession be dragged down into the dumpster?
Thief isn’t in an OK place, D/P and staff are, maybe S/D but guess not.
Your set might be in an ok place, thief the class isn’t. So, why has thief been buffed? Right, because all builds were dead. How easy is it to kill D/P the set? Not easy, otherwise it wouldn’t have been the only set halfway viable after June. Those who sticked to this forum are D/P thieves (and me) – so all traits were modified to suit D/P best = even less chance for my set. If you had taken the time and at least read the first 2 pages of this thread – you’d knew where I’m coming from, but instead you chose to act like a
whiny little brat
“My preferred weapon set is in a bad place so everyone’s weapon set should be in a bad place” that’s how this whole sham of a thread reads to me, maybe if you spent more time trying to come up with constructive ways to improve d/d rather than just whining that d/p is more viable and should be made kitten as well something positive might come out of this thread
That’s good as this is kind of how it’s meant – wouldn’t you do the same?
Btw: If you knew thief you’d know where the problems lie – and buffing D/D isn’t that easy.
But in the end, truth being told, every time I faced a D/P thief I was rolling my eyes and though “oh my, another noob thief”.
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My way of thinking was like this since I wasn’t clear enough:
Buffs favored D/P, means buffs favored D/P more than D/D, S/D, Staff, P/P, etc.
But D/P didn’t get any major buffs over D/D (They both share the auto buff).
Thus saying D/P profited the most from these buffs doesn’t make sense.
The traits were also buffed and it suited D/P best.
I guess with that you’re not confused anymore.
Or just nerf everything to the level of D/D? (Because if we keep on nerfing D/P and Staff, then S/D or maybe even P/P will rise to the top. Not D/D). But in that case why not just buff D/D in the first place.
Because it’s not that simple – read the edited OP which has got a summary of most we’ve discussed in this thread. Or better: from my point of view.
This is plain silly, you’re saying D/P has to be nerfed because you like to play DD or SD? DP is fine, if you feel like DD is weak, maybe you need to learn to play the class and not ask Game administrators to nerf other playstyles because you don’t know how to play? Get outta here child.
The reasons for this are in my OP, also in the thread – just buffing the other weaponset isn’t enough to bring them on par with D/P. But I don’t object to them being buffed.
And I kind of guess I know how to play.
And finally Drayos.8759 :
Yes, let them destroy their own game – they’re halfway there anyway – having only 2 viable sets is boring – for any class. Even if the other sets were buffed D/P would still be the strongest. And D/P has always been our top set – it has never been nerfed to the ground – because it’s pretty hard to do so.
And yes, it seems as if anet messed up – back in June and again with Hot – I don’t think this was intention, they just had better things to do than balance. I doubt that people are really happy to learn that the set they used while leveling and liked isn’t viable in any of the “endgames” of pve, wvw or pvp. And that’s why I say: destroy it (D/P) and rebuild the whole class – that probably is for all classes we have. I never minded that D/D was harder to play, I actually didn’t get for a long time that I chose the hardest to play class with the hardest to play weapon set – but I want at least be able to pull it off, if even with a slightly bigger effort (= things were fine before June and before February even more).
ETA: So in the end (I know of some warrior traits which have also been removed but didn’t look too much into the changes of the other classes) : What they have to do is to have a good look at all sets (not just thief) – examine their playstyle in all game modes and look what traits they’ve deleted = what the weapons needed. They can either buff the weapons so they have the utility they took from the traits, or introduce some more traitlines to chose from. Maybe the traitmerge really was was killed certain sets. As no matter what I do, I just can’t get the traits I need to make my set work again.
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Surprised this thread is still alive.
Don’t know if this has already been mentioned. But to put things in context, don’t most classes only have 2-3 viable weaponsets, with one rising above the others?
Following this suggestion, I guess every class should have it’s main weaponset nerfed?
Also replying to the post directly above, with thief only having two offhands the dagger buff would have either benefited D/P or D/D more. With D/P being the more likely candidate for obvious reasons.
Expecting the Sword or Staff buffs to affect D/P or D/D doesn’t make sense. You could argue that dagger mainhand got buffed more than Sword mainhand or Staff, but that’s not the same as arguing that D/P got buffed more than the rest of the weaponsets.
Edit:
Will say though that pistol mainhand got shafted. Although it’s always been shafted and that’s not something I necessarily agree with myself.
I didn’t argue that S/D should’ve been buffed because of the dagger buff – and I didn’t speak about the D buff anyway – but thanks for assuming that I expect sword to be buffed because the dagger buff.
But what I wanted to respond to: I don’t know too much about other classes, but I played D/D although it wasn’t the meta, yet it was still halfway viable. I guess most people play what’s “best” – one explanation why there’s little diversity. Question is if that’s really what a game design wants/should aim for.
In june 3 of our sets have been taken away, don’t know if S/D is viable again, but the other 2 aren’t.
Wake up, sd or sp will never be buffed anet dont want us to be using those weapons
That’s sure how it looks like.
But know what?! the only reason why thief finally was buffed was because it was completely out of the meta : a reason to nerf D/P (as it’s the most viable build we’ve got – see the OP) – and hey, guess what set most profited from the buffs – right D/P – who would’ve imagined?
Put daredevil into the game before June and it’s ridiculously OP – put any of the “metabuilds” in there and it’s ridiculously OP as well.
The problem is that hitting someone has become RNG – and instead of fixing it they’re adding more RNG. You can only save “underperforming” classes by adding more passives and “dual skills” (which are passives as well).
Buut, by the looks of it I’m pretty much out of the game as I can’t take another 7 months of frustration and “you’re not welcome here”.
So you can add your directional skill to DB which would destroy the set for me.
ETA: (you’ll stick to D/P anyway – oh and just because it says “put your camera on max speed” doesn’t mean it’s for everyone – you should lower it a bit to handle your gameplay better – just something I noticed).
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Hi. So I’ve been playing a thief for a couple weeks now and it’s really fun! Exploring with a thief is such a different experience. However, i’m an Australian player and consistently have ~ 230-300 ping, often with a small but still noticeable delay between skills. Would you guys say that a thief unplayable with this amount of latency? I really like the profession, but i’d rather just go back to my engi if i’m not going to be able to perform adequately or even survive adequately on a thief.
Depends on the game mode probably. I managed to pull D/D thief off on NA with a 200 ping (I’m EU) – don’t ask me how I did it – my win ratio became higher on EU though. I’m a wvw player, playing pvp with that latency might be worse.
Mauge: That isn’t the point.
The point is that this game has become brainless all around. I already wrote about DB and explained why it has once been a great skill (and if traited vanilla still is) – the problem is everything new.
ETA: And why on earth do I have to fight to be able to play my class (and spec)? is there anything sader than that (in a game)?!
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@ baba: No, they aren’t – you can throw your oxford dictionary at me or get away from “how things should be defined” and get what has been said and discuss that.
I think anet has left this game long ago btw.
ETA: If you don’t have to think because your skill carries you it’s lazy. It’s nice if it’s just a few, it’s bad if your playstyle is defined by it. And thus dual skills are no better than passives.
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You are conflating multiple effects, or impacts with passivity. Which effect of an attack like impairing daggers is passive?
You refuse to get the point – a dual skill that defends and attacks at the same time in a bulk is just as bad as having multiple invulnerabilities – maybe even worse (depends)
I don’t give a kitten what babaa and you think how the term should be used.
Except that I actively used the dodge saving the endurance for the burst and repositioned. Had it not done damage there would be no question about using the dodge actively. In this scenario with damage both the dodge and the damage were active components of play. I didn’t mention hoping to dodge the burst, I kept enough endurance to wait for it and dodge it.
You said, “You aimed your dodge in an attempt to damage them using it as an attack”, thus the intention is clear that your goal is to do damage and relying on evade to passively negate the damage.
However, if you Bound backwards and happen to do damage to someone else, that damage is passive.
Here’s the thing. You mentioned intention here for the determination of a passive or active attack. Say I have untraited dodges with the endurance to use them and the availability of deathblossom. I have the choice of using either. I choose to use deathblossom because I want to counterattack. The intent is to both evade the damage and deal damage back to them. Neither effect is passive there.
The evade is passive.
- If you’re trying to evade target-1 and do damage to target-1, then the evade is passive in this scenario.
- If you’re trying to evade target-1 and damages target-2, then the damage is passive.
- If you’re trying to evade backward from target-1 but target-1 shadowstep to you then you happen to deal damage to target-1, the damage is still the passive.Let’s blur the lines more. Is a skill that reflects a projectile passive or active.
Let’s use the engi flamethrower airblast as the example here. My intent is to stop a kill shot from hitting me. I could dodge it. I choose to reflect it instead. Is the reflection passive? It deals the kill shot back to the warrior. It seems that by your stance on counterattacking would define the reflected shot as a passive effect.
I think the confusion here is the difference between activated vs passive and skill vs effect.
Dodge is an activated skill, but the evade that comes with the dodge is the passive effect.
Activating a skill to apply a reflect effect is obviously not passive, since it is an activated skill. Once the skill is activated, the reflect effect does its thing without addition user input, thus it is passive.
Attacks can have both offensive and defensive aspects to them. That doesn’t make them passive. Deathblossom is not passive, just poorly designed because it’s spammable.
Nobody is saying that DB is passive, rather it has a passive effect depending on how you use it.
Let me put it this way. A boulder thrown by a snow wurm can hit multiple times (I know, used them for daily dodges). If you dodge the boulder, the evade effect will proc multiple times. If evade is not passive, then I will have to activate dodge for each possible hits making multiple activate evades. The fact that I don’t have to actively evade means that the evade effect is passive.
You are trying to separate cause and effect by way of duration. Under this classification, any cleave damage or an attack with multiple impacts would be considered a passive attack.
The attack is an activated skill — the hits, on the other hand, are not. The hit is one of the effects of the attack since the effect of an attack is either a hit or a miss. The initial hit is a direct result of activating the attack, the additional hits are passive effects.
That is a specious argument. That’s like saying you stabbed someone but didn’t kill them because they died of exsanguination.
Bleeding is another passive effect from DB. If they died from bleeding, then they died from bleeding. If you exhaust your initiative from using DB and your target died from multiple stacks of bleeding condition, then yes, they bled to death.
So damage is a passive effect within this game?
It’s simple: You can use DB to either evade or to attack.
Evade: bleed is passive
Attack: evade is passive
As the latter isn’t intended in each case – it might be however that you evaded an attack although you didn’t intend to or that you killed someone although you didn’t intend to.
If you’re intending to do both at the same time there’s no need to tell you that this skill is badly designed.
The bleed and damage from DB used to be that weak and we didn’t have access to that many initative and additional evades (you have to be quick = on your target to get that bleed stacks up) that before HoT a build like that never worked – not even in “the condi meta”.
In the end, you can always look at a fight between two opponents of the same class and build – if they are unable to kill each other then something is wrong. best example has been cele-ele. So now imagine 2 thieves 1 vs 1 who evade every hit.
ETA²: I’m not saying that thief is neccessarily OP but if the other classes hadn’t had that many passives it would be = this game is screwed up since June.
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Well, facerolling requires input from the player as well – I guess you got my point. If not: I wrote everything I had to say about it – if it’s still not clear what I mean, then well.. read it again, I guess.
Yes that is, but I doubt that people spamming vault really do so because they want to evade.
No matter how you turn it: skills like that are bad. They can be nice in moderation but not if they’re “spammable”. ETA: Spammable also by having multiple skills that do the same thing.
ETA²: And like I said; you use that skill to evade an attack, the damage you also deal isn’t that important I guess, so that’s the passive in that case.
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ETA: I mean weaponskills that evade, btw.
Weaponskills that evade are not passives. They require input to use. Passives would be something like the new instant reflexes that automatically trigger when a condition is met that you had no control over or just grant a permanent buff.
To more clearly define it, our signets are a passive buff until you activate them. Passive vs. Active effect.
They are – they are dual skill – you can either chose to attack or to evade – the second skill is in that case passive. It’s not that hard to get what I mean, is it?
ETA: “Uhh, I’m gonna hit this guy – oh, he tried to hit me at the same time but my skill let me evade that.. nifty!”
Or: “Uhh, I’m better evade this hit – wow I killed this guy while evading, didn’t intend to but I’ll take it”
ETA²: And better don’t try to discuss this further with me as I will go ballistic and call all of you brain dead.
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If you are talking about the DD GM traits those are not Passives they are replacement/additional affects. You have to actively decide to dodge to use them. Which makes them not passive. Passive is where there is no user input what so ever.
ETA: I mean weaponskills that evade, btw.
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I usually add stuff to what I’m writing – but your window seems to have been open a long time if you didn’t see that :P
Anyway, I already said in my initial post that I mean skills that also evade – so I don’t get why all of you think I mean dodges.
@ Jana those are not passives. Passives are effects that happen even when you are not happening, like Don’t Stop’s cripple/chill effectiveness decrease and immobilize conversion. The DrD dodges are not since all they do is replace the original dodge which requires action on the player’s part.
And next time kinda read the rest of the post. Hard to Catch was one of those traits that all thieves kittened about. It was still a passive proc trait but it killed more than it saved. This version is a complete 180 from that and it really needed it.
In fact alot of the changes they made were asked for, as babashook stated, that were made during a time when thieves only had one role. It was a time before they got pushed out of the meta entirely. If you need someone to blame about these decisions, blame the ones who asked for them years ago. Because all anet did was listen to them.
They are passives as you don’t chose “I want to evade” but the skill does this for you.
Hard to catch was a bad trait, yes, it’s a better trait now – still it’s a passive and that was my point. Thief survivability now lies in passively evading 50% of the attacks – not what I want in this game.
What anet should do: Stop listening to players and learn how their own game works – problem: Most are D/P so “everything” suits D/P – what should I do? Quit the game as I have no voice?
That was one of my points. To think about what you want vs. what it means for the profession.
I did, did you?
Ps: You do realize that we only have 2 sets left, out of formerly 4 when staff wasn’t even around?!
ETA: I mean weaponskills that evade, btw.
A very late ETA:
On the one hand you say that anet implemented “everything” players suggested – on the other hand you say “we” should shut up – does that even make sense to you?
(And that’s why I say the players shouldn’t be the important factor when it comes to balancing – a lot of stuff suggested on here is over the top, yes, but in reality the last patch barely scratched the surface of the problems thief as a class has got – and that is also because that what counts balance wise are the players and that shouldn’t be).
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Trying to convince Jana that SA wasn’t mandatory or even more-useful to D/D over D/P before June is nigh impossible.
True that. But I do wonder why you don’t remember my arguments for that.
Here’s why (already said it plenty of times):
D/D has to be melee = aoe and condis = SE and CiS
D/P could/can go in and out of melee/aoe, they have the blind on SS (and pistol 5). Only thing D/P “needed” out of that line was SE which was covered by spending 2 points in that line. (the extra initative could be gained by either SA or T)
Since they’ve got more access to stealth they also drew/draw a bigger benefit out of SRej – so all “SA IS OP NERF” cries actually meant D/P, in my opinion.
ETA: Counterquestion: if it never has been like that, that the sets of thief (except D/P) had to get their utility from traits, then how come only D/P was halfway viable after June 23th?
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immunity to reveal while standing inside of it.
That’s actually a really good idea.
Another example to help clear up what I mean. Look at how relatively weak venoms are. The problem is that to make venoms any good, you are locked into a specific build and traitline. Venoms should be good untraited, and traits should add a little boost on top, not the binary nature of UP/OP when untraited/traited respectively that we have now.
It has always been like that – the weapons we have have got distinctive skills – you could either take that away or modify the traits. I don’t really oppose giving CnD blind, but that would be more “into the same direction” as if there were different equally useful traits. And yes, that’s my point, that’s why I’m saying D/P should sacrifice some of the utility and get it back from traits.
And that is my point as well: Look how “OP” D/P is as all traits add to the already good utility.
I don’t know too much about venoms, I have never used them – but as far as I know they’re pretty strong, so maybe turning half of it into traits was to prevent them being “OP” but that didn’t happen with D/P.But that’s the thing. You keep advocating moving skills into lines that would make the lines mandatory and runs the same risk of being messed up as whats’s happened to D/D. D/P is well designed and well balanced. D/D is not. Your idea would be to take the utility from the set and do what with it? Headshot does nothing unless traited? BPS does nothing unless traited? Nerfing shadowshot damage is the only possible move that would be reasonable and honestly that doesn’t even need to be given back as a trait. Here’s the thing though. Until offhand dagger is given more utility, D/D isn’t going to be any better. It’s going to require a specific traitline to make it viable for you and that’s just not good for it. It needs to be able to stand on it’s own so multiple builds can be made for it. We already have problems with thief being locked into core lines to make it decent. We don’t need to keep locking ourselves into lines.
Reread my last post adressed to you – you skipped what I wrote.
ETA:
They took most (or all) of the set specific traits away in June and that what remained was D/P.
All other sets had to trait for their utility – maybe that was to balance them. D/P is the only set that never “needed” a trait line because all of its utility is on the set. All traits did was making this set stronger. As long as D/P remained, thief seemed fine – although we only had one build left. D/P has got twice as many utilities as other sets but no drawbacks. You can’t buff the other sets good enough (weaponwise) to create original sets – we had traits for that.
Just because you didn’t need traits doesn’t mean it’s really meant like this. Maybe they forgot about their initial premise and added D/P to the game without realizing what exactly they’ve done. And in June they forgot that all other sets are trait based.
ETA² – and before the traitline merge we still had stats tied to the lines, so certain lines have been favoured over others.
I hated the ferocity patch at first but later on acknowledged that it was probably the best that they’ve done – with some exceptions: Condis OP and thief being forced to go full glass (I don’t know why, my excuse: I have been a noob back then – and still am – I don’t know the numbers between the stuff that has been changed). So full glass means they had to take either DA or CS or both if they wanted to be viable. So nobody really noticed the utility D/P has as everybody was using the same traitlines anyway.
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Before I’m out for the night: Please don’t forget that thief is a unique snowflake due to the initative system – our class has to be handled differently than other classes. (= it might be justified that we have to get our “utility” from traits).
They took most (or all) of the set specific traits away in June and that what remained was D/P.
I might even fix the forum bug with this post – woohoo!
This is not news. This has literally been like this for more than a year. This post title is pure cancer though, I would consider changing it.
Alright informative insertion.
Would “D/P is pure cancer” be better?
Another example to help clear up what I mean. Look at how relatively weak venoms are. The problem is that to make venoms any good, you are locked into a specific build and traitline. Venoms should be good untraited, and traits should add a little boost on top, not the binary nature of UP/OP when untraited/traited respectively that we have now.
It has always been like that – the weapons we have have got distinctive skills – you could either take that away or modify the traits. I don’t really oppose giving CnD blind, but that would be more “into the same direction” as if there were different equally useful traits. And yes, that’s my point, that’s why I’m saying D/P should sacrifice some of the utility and get it back from traits.
And that is my point as well: Look how “OP” D/P is as all traits add to the already good utility.
I don’t know too much about venoms, I have never used them – but as far as I know they’re pretty strong, so maybe turning half of it into traits was to prevent them being “OP” but that didn’t happen with D/P.
@ Maugetarr: If you look at it all offhand weapons need help – we have at least 50% useless traits, why not redesign them? CiS is a trait I’m fine using it as long as it is in a traitline I can actually use – former SA suited my plystyle really well: There theoretically is a way to make most of this trait based – it has been in the past. Only set that never needed a specific traitline is/was D/P.
Is it D/P as a weapon set that’s too powerful
“Please nerf D/P” sounds like it, doesn’kitten
Is it just D/P #3?
Yes as it’s the only distinctive D/P skill – but overall the synergy of all skills is what makes D/P extremely powerful and in case of most other thief sets: “OP”.
Is it the traits?
Also, yes as D/P itself is self sustained – it’s the weaponset that can chose any traits they like and still be viable.
It would be nice for discussion if we had some concrete points to address, because as the OP stands atm, it will lead nowhere.
I agree that the OP isn’t really worded that well, but we’ve got 5 pages of discussion right now, with different people who joined in, you could’ve saved yourself some time by reading the first page and realize that all your questions have been answered there already.
And with that: I already wrote everything, it’s on the first 2 pages max, the second last post I adressed to Maugetarr sums my opinion up pretty nicely – hopes that helps “her or him”.