Guild Wars 2

Balefire.7592:

Jugglemonkey.8741:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Draehl.2681:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

ITS OUR TURN BABY!
this video can explain to you exactly whats going on.

PS: diamond skin has not shut down the necromancer class, just the necromancer condi builds. (just so that is clear)

Please tell me when was the last time a power Necro killed an Ele.
Especially given the fact we can no longer Chill, Cripple or Fear you to catch up with your mobility.

You’re thinking a little too simple tho darling. Baby you gotta think outside the box. What you’re feeling right now is similar to what i was feeling when eles got nerfed and other professions got buffed. I was forced to think outside the box, and experiment.

There is no “outside the box” here. Necros have no hard CC outside of the three conditions I listed (plus one Immob, which is also a condition). A dagger Necro simply cannot stay on any Ele with a pulse long enough to do damage.\
I don’t care that they nerfed condition damage builds. I care that they nerfed the few skills Necros had that could let them land damage/prevent escapes.

Yea, you shouldve heard me in the forums when eles got nerfed. Its all part of the cycle man. You’re soon going to realize that this is intended, that it’s eles time to shine, and that necros time to shine is coming to a close now. That doesn’t mean that necros are going to be completely useless, cause i stuck it out with ele and in a few weeks i found something half-way decent to carry me through to this patch. If you dont like the type of balancing anet does, that means theyre actually succeeding. Thats just the nature of imperfect balancing.

I’m well aware that Ele’s have suffered. But an eye for an eye leaves the world blind.
I’m not asking for the removal of Diamond Skin. You can keep it – but a version that doesn’t ruin everything Necros are about.

fortunately you have attacks that do damage and damage is what counters diamond skin. if the ele is outhealing you, that means hes full bunker and he cant kill you anyway. if he IS killing you, that means he is zerk spec and you’re power necro builds are going to rip him apart. give the meta some time to shift.

That’s the whole point though. If we can’t catch the Ele, we can’t do any damage. I’m not asking for a removal of the trait – keep your bleed, poison, burning and torment immunity. Condi spam is OP, so that’s valid. But my snares aren’t what kills you, they’re what allows me to actually be able to fight.

think of something. That’s on you. adapt to the gameplay is all i can say. i need to go to bed, ill visit this forum tomorrow to talk some more. peace

Translation: There is no counter – I want your class to be complete trash because mine was.

yup. like i said, eles time to shine. and you’re very right in thinking that im going to enjoy the hell out of steam-rolling every single necro i run into. its going to be a necro-slaughtering for the next few months. i love it, and every second i will cherish it.

Ele’s have every right to their time in the spotlight. But if it comes at the expense of another profession, you may need to re-evaluate your definition of balance.

It counters a very specific build, and one that sorely needed a counter at that. If every necro is using one build as your post implies, then that means one of two things: There’s a lack of build diversity, or the build the necro is using is OP as all sin and needed a counter. Since power necros are definitely a thing, the latter is likely true.

Every build needs a counter. If you don’t want to adapt to this counter to condi tanks, that’s not the developer’s fault.

As I stated earlier, please provide verifiable evidence that Power Necros are a thing in high level PvP.

If no-one uses power necros in high level PvP, that just proves my point that the condi spam build is OP. Power based necro builds can demolish things when used properly, try it out.

Tricare.2946:

Jugglemonkey.8741:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Draehl.2681:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

ITS OUR TURN BABY!
this video can explain to you exactly whats going on.

PS: diamond skin has not shut down the necromancer class, just the necromancer condi builds. (just so that is clear)

Please tell me when was the last time a power Necro killed an Ele.
Especially given the fact we can no longer Chill, Cripple or Fear you to catch up with your mobility.

You’re thinking a little too simple tho darling. Baby you gotta think outside the box. What you’re feeling right now is similar to what i was feeling when eles got nerfed and other professions got buffed. I was forced to think outside the box, and experiment.

There is no “outside the box” here. Necros have no hard CC outside of the three conditions I listed (plus one Immob, which is also a condition). A dagger Necro simply cannot stay on any Ele with a pulse long enough to do damage.\
I don’t care that they nerfed condition damage builds. I care that they nerfed the few skills Necros had that could let them land damage/prevent escapes.

Yea, you shouldve heard me in the forums when eles got nerfed. Its all part of the cycle man. You’re soon going to realize that this is intended, that it’s eles time to shine, and that necros time to shine is coming to a close now. That doesn’t mean that necros are going to be completely useless, cause i stuck it out with ele and in a few weeks i found something half-way decent to carry me through to this patch. If you dont like the type of balancing anet does, that means theyre actually succeeding. Thats just the nature of imperfect balancing.

I’m well aware that Ele’s have suffered. But an eye for an eye leaves the world blind.
I’m not asking for the removal of Diamond Skin. You can keep it – but a version that doesn’t ruin everything Necros are about.

fortunately you have attacks that do damage and damage is what counters diamond skin. if the ele is outhealing you, that means hes full bunker and he cant kill you anyway. if he IS killing you, that means he is zerk spec and you’re power necro builds are going to rip him apart. give the meta some time to shift.

That’s the whole point though. If we can’t catch the Ele, we can’t do any damage. I’m not asking for a removal of the trait – keep your bleed, poison, burning and torment immunity. Condi spam is OP, so that’s valid. But my snares aren’t what kills you, they’re what allows me to actually be able to fight.

think of something. That’s on you. adapt to the gameplay is all i can say. i need to go to bed, ill visit this forum tomorrow to talk some more. peace

Translation: There is no counter – I want your class to be complete trash because mine was.

yup. like i said, eles time to shine. and you’re very right in thinking that im going to enjoy the hell out of steam-rolling every single necro i run into. its going to be a necro-slaughtering for the next few months. i love it, and every second i will cherish it.

Ele’s have every right to their time in the spotlight. But if it comes at the expense of another profession, you may need to re-evaluate your definition of balance.

It counters a very specific build, and one that sorely needed a counter at that. If every necro is using one build as your post implies, then that means one of two things: There’s a lack of build diversity, or the build the necro is using is OP as all sin and needed a counter. Since power necros are definitely a thing, the latter is likely true.

Every build needs a counter. If you don’t want to adapt to this counter to condi tanks, that’s not the developer’s fault.

It’s a sign of horrible balance in a game when one trait can cancel out a whole professions build.

Look on the bright side, I play thief and anyone can stealth trap me, taking away my regen, damage and condi cleanse -.-

Condi-spam tank builds are a counter to my thief, diamond skin ele is a counter to your condi-spam tank build, and my thief is a counter to diamond skin eles. Every build has a counter, that’s how it should work.

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Draehl.2681:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Balefire.7592:

The Game Slayer.7632:

ITS OUR TURN BABY!
this video can explain to you exactly whats going on.

PS: diamond skin has not shut down the necromancer class, just the necromancer condi builds. (just so that is clear)

Please tell me when was the last time a power Necro killed an Ele.
Especially given the fact we can no longer Chill, Cripple or Fear you to catch up with your mobility.

You’re thinking a little too simple tho darling. Baby you gotta think outside the box. What you’re feeling right now is similar to what i was feeling when eles got nerfed and other professions got buffed. I was forced to think outside the box, and experiment.

There is no “outside the box” here. Necros have no hard CC outside of the three conditions I listed (plus one Immob, which is also a condition). A dagger Necro simply cannot stay on any Ele with a pulse long enough to do damage.\
I don’t care that they nerfed condition damage builds. I care that they nerfed the few skills Necros had that could let them land damage/prevent escapes.

Yea, you shouldve heard me in the forums when eles got nerfed. Its all part of the cycle man. You’re soon going to realize that this is intended, that it’s eles time to shine, and that necros time to shine is coming to a close now. That doesn’t mean that necros are going to be completely useless, cause i stuck it out with ele and in a few weeks i found something half-way decent to carry me through to this patch. If you dont like the type of balancing anet does, that means theyre actually succeeding. Thats just the nature of imperfect balancing.

I’m well aware that Ele’s have suffered. But an eye for an eye leaves the world blind.
I’m not asking for the removal of Diamond Skin. You can keep it – but a version that doesn’t ruin everything Necros are about.

fortunately you have attacks that do damage and damage is what counters diamond skin. if the ele is outhealing you, that means hes full bunker and he cant kill you anyway. if he IS killing you, that means he is zerk spec and you’re power necro builds are going to rip him apart. give the meta some time to shift.

That’s the whole point though. If we can’t catch the Ele, we can’t do any damage. I’m not asking for a removal of the trait – keep your bleed, poison, burning and torment immunity. Condi spam is OP, so that’s valid. But my snares aren’t what kills you, they’re what allows me to actually be able to fight.

think of something. That’s on you. adapt to the gameplay is all i can say. i need to go to bed, ill visit this forum tomorrow to talk some more. peace

Translation: There is no counter – I want your class to be complete trash because mine was.

yup. like i said, eles time to shine. and you’re very right in thinking that im going to enjoy the hell out of steam-rolling every single necro i run into. its going to be a necro-slaughtering for the next few months. i love it, and every second i will cherish it.

Ele’s have every right to their time in the spotlight. But if it comes at the expense of another profession, you may need to re-evaluate your definition of balance.

It counters a very specific build, and one that sorely needed a counter at that. If every necro is using one build as your post implies, then that means one of two things: There’s a lack of build diversity, or the build the necro is using is OP as all sin and needed a counter. Since power necros are definitely a thing, the latter is likely true.

Every build needs a counter. If you don’t want to adapt to this counter to condi tanks, that’s not the developer’s fault.

Travlane.5948:

Jugglemonkey.8741:

This would work, if the majority of the player base played thief. As it is, I don’t think enough people play thief for an embargo to make a difference to their income. At least, according to the one year on stats they published (google it).

i dont think those stats are accurate. they didnt give a baseline how they got them. i bet they are WAY off.

They almost certainly are lol. I think they simply counted the number of each profession across all accounts then worked out a percentage, so accounts that have a lv4 thief that has only been played an hour since launch will still have been counted towards the thief total.

Stats are wonderful things. Did you know that 90% of all road accidents involving a pedestrian happen on the pavement? So logically, to reduce the risk of being run over, pedestrians should walk in the road. (Some people I know from college genuinely could not find fault with this argument. The world is a scary place :P )

aLovedhater.4096:

@jugglemonkey the heal skill does work with all the venom traits, if it doesn’t then there is a bug. you take spider for extra poison + weakness from poison, skale for vulnerability stacks and torment. and you take both for the free healing/damage, i explained this earlyer in my very first post, if you havn’t read that. the condi’s aren’t for full damage, you’re power for condi damage, they are used for heal/dmg on use @ weakness heal reduction, ect. the condi damage is just a bonus. i do like the extra power though, please keep in mind the damage your venoms do alone. just because i don’t have the sa 25 point trait doesn’t mean i can’t make up for it in other ways. many build dont take blinding powder and shadow refuge, for example s/d | d/p build. just because you dont have shadow refuge doesn’t mean it’s the end of the world, i think it has enough survivability from just the leach/venom themselves, but that’s just what i think. thanks for not being negative like the majority of people on here o/ merry wintersday.

I read the first post, and I honestly think that any build can be effective in the right hands. My concern is that whilst the damage and healing from the life leech looks really nice, this to me is really the only thing you gain over the standard build, and you’re forced to use at least 2 venom utilities to get it. That being said, it’s hard to see how much survivability the venoms give you without having tried it.

I personally think the extra might and regen from shadow arts would be more valuable than the lotus poison and cool down reduction from deadly arts (10/30/30), but if you prefer your way then don’t let me stop you. I do tend to build more defensively than I need to as I have a nasty habit of picking fights with groups, so maybe my concerns are stemming from that :P

(P.S. You might also want consider using devourer venom over skale venom, as some classes have no way to counter immobilise so it might be more useful than the torment.)

This would work, if the majority of the player base played thief. As it is, I don’t think enough people play thief for an embargo to make a difference to their income. At least, according to the one year on stats they published (google it).

Can’t say I’ve really felt the difference yet. I only really run D/D and D/P, P/D when I’m feeling fruity.

So in my opinion, we now have even more traits that don’t have a noticeable effect, in exchange for a buff that doesn’t have a noticeable effect. Genius….

On the plus side, I can now HS 5 times in a row when covering ground in WvW.

Woot.

Oxygen.5918:

Jugglemonkey.8741:

It’s mainly an issue with infiltrator’s signet, I’ve noticed it randomly attack when trying to use it defensively. Also, guildies have told me that whilst dueling me they can sometimes see the signet symbol appear above my head, giving away my position despite my being in stealth at the time. Kinda makes infiltrators feel like a panto “he’s behind you!” button :/

Every signet does this if you are in melee range while weilding a weapon, or at range and facing your target. It’s obnoxious because it’s like a shi**y hidden feature that nobody asked for. Like, oh, I’d love this defensive skill to make me lose my stealth for no reason at all because it made my character unjustifiably. Just awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!111111111111111111111111

Sorry, my phrasing was bad. It does happen with all signets, I just notice it most with infiltrators since it automatically front-stabs before I get chance to move around the target.

Withdraw heals for somewhere between 2/3 and 3/4 what hide in shadows does, but it has half the cool down. Unless you trait for heal/regen in stealth and then actually STAY in stealth for the 4 seconds, withdraw heals more over time. Travlane’s numbers are pretty accurate.
I’ve also read on the forums that the new heal skill doesn’t benefit from some of the venom traits. I don’t know how true this is or which traits specifically, but it would be worth testing before replacing HiS or withdraw.

The build is a nice idea, my main problem with it is that you would gain roughly the same amount of health from the SA grandmaster trait by using stealth on rotation. If you time the steal properly with mug traited, you don’t need the spider venom for the poison either.
The condis won’t be hitting that hard, since there’s not many of them and they have no condi damage to buff them. The extra power is nice, but if you use 10/30/30 for mug you only need 3 stacks of might to get the same power output as your build. This is easily achievable with the SA 25 point trait, and the might will buff your condi damage too.

So from my PoV, if the power is roughly the same, the condi damage gained is negligible, the main thing you gain over a 10/30/30 build is the damage from the life leech. To gain this, you’ve given up using shadow refuge and blinding powder for survivability, or assassin’s signet and devourer venom for damage & control.

It depends how you play really, I’m sure your build is effective in your hands, I just think the venoms don’t add enough to justify the loss of the other things. That’s my 2 cents anyways :P

It’s just a shame the venoms aren’t done better tbh. I’d love to see them used more often, and for it not to just feel like a party trick :/

All other classes have received major buffs recently whilst we got nerfs, or we got buffs to broken/underplayed skills that don’t really help that much. So, we’ve been left behind by the meta somewhat. That’s not to say we’re not viable, just that our margin for error during a fight has never been smaller.

D/D and D/P are still very strong for WvW. An earlier poster linked Yishis’ youtube channel, his builds are pretty much the WvW meta atm and he explains his tactics too, a very valuable resource right there. Check out outnumbered 6 for D/P, D/D for the others in that series.

P/D is pretty strong if you want to go the condi route, although this is less common for roaming since it’s a DoT thing. I do think that with the S/D changes it’s going to be the most viable juke friendly build post patch, so if that playstyle appeals to you then give it a whirl.

Other sets can be used too, but most of the other options are limited when fighting more than one opponent. Since being a thief seems to make you an aggro magnet, it limits their use somewhat.

It’s mainly an issue with infiltrator’s signet, I’ve noticed it randomly attack when trying to use it defensively. Also, guildies have told me that whilst dueling me they can sometimes see the signet symbol appear above my head, giving away my position despite my being in stealth at the time. Kinda makes infiltrators feel like a panto “he’s behind you!” button :/

Same thing happened to me whilst roaming with another thief, a necro and a guardian sat on the trap and waited for the free loot bag. I got hit by the trap and got focused into the floor.

My roaming partner then got me up and we murdered them of course, but that’s beside the point. When 2 of the tankiest classes in the game abuse a mechanic that removes pretty much all healing, damage, condi cleanse and blinds from the squishiest class in the game just to get an easy kill, it speaks volumes about how badly balanced said mechanic is.

I’d love to see the reaction if an anti adrenaline/death shroud trap came out, but of course that wouldn’t happen since that would victimize warriors/necros…. -.-

Jugglemonkey.8741:

I had some success duelling a bunker condi engi the other day, I was messing around with a 10/0/30/0/30 P/D condi build. I had to use the fact that he will sit in his turrets against him to win.

Try stealthing up with shadow refuge when he uses his supply crate, putting caltrops down under his turrets, then using thieves’ guild.
Stealth off the turrets when possible to confuse him & remove conditions, and alternate between sneak attack and shadow strike to keep condi pressure up while your thieves CC him.

You can also steal from him and use the goo with dancing dagger to apply stupid amounts of confusion to him, since this will bounce off the turrets for extra stacks. With the amount of skills they use and the lack of condi clean they have, this is ludicrously effective.

Most importantly, keep moving! Attack from different directions, and change tactics every few seconds to stop them predicting your movements. It’s still a very hard fight though, even when you play perfectly :/

Sorry, just realised you were asking about sword strategy. Just ignore the above lol :P

Thanks for the perspective guys Like I say, I just wondered if this was the way of things, apparently so :/

As for rangers, I roam with a ranger guildie quite a lot, and we take advantage of his supposed weakness. He has the high toughness/regen/protection thing going on so he’s a sod to take down, I just let him run in first and everyone focuses him whilst I gank things behind him. It’s funny to do, but I kinda feel sorry for him being the dedicated arrow magnet, since everyone expects an easy kill :/

Hey there

I run soldiers head/chest/legs and zerker shoulders/gloves/boots (Look up posts on the forums by Wish, great advice ) with valkyrie weapons, as it gives pretty comparable damage to full zerker but your survivability is FAR better. I’d hazard a guess that they were doing something similar.

The problem with zerkers is that the main thing you gain over using soldier/valkyrie is the precision, since the power is the same for all pieces. So once you get your crit chance to about 50% after food then add fury, there’s no real benefit to adding more zerkers since most of your hits will crit anyways. As these crits will hit the same sort of numbers due to the identical power, you might as well pump that extra precision into some sort of defensive stat.

Plus, since power stacks better than crit damage for your typical thief build, the extra vit/toughness from soldiers will give more power from sharpening stones, which makes up for the loss of crit damage (to a point, obviously you won’t get the same dps from pure soldiers and pure zerk :P ).

Say we can both crit on a backstab for 7k. My D/D build has around 20k health after guard defence stacks (overkill I know), pure zerk will have around 12k generally. I can take 2 backstabs and still be standing, you can’t. This also doesn’t take armour into account, if they stack toughness then your backstab might do 4k whilst theirs does 8-9k. If your buddy is zerk too, you can see how they have an advantage.

They prob also had 30 in shadow arts, so were gaining approx 330 health per sec when they were in stealth. As long as you play carefully, a tanker thief can run rings around people :P

Sorry about the incoherent rant, I hope that helps in some way :P

The traits you’re running would be better suited to a P/D spec IMO, as that would give you blind on stealth & regen for sustain, plenty of stealth for sneak attack to bleed and a ton of dodges. It’s a lot of fun and def fit’s the troll spec you’re looking for, might be worth a look

As for your specific questions, what azerte said is great advice, here’s a few thoughts:

1) Shadowstep is practically mandatory for WvW, dagger storm is great for killing rangers and rifle warriors that are too stupid to stop shooting you :P

3) I also use traveler runes (as I expect most WvW thieves do these days), runes of speed are good if you’re low on cash and want the move speed, ogre and lyssa can both be pretty useful too. It depends what you think would benefit your play style most.

5) Again what azerte said, if you’re running dagger offhand you can cast CnD then steal midway through the animation to get a stealth & damage out of nowhere, plus set you up for a sneak attack. You might enjoy S/D for that reason.

Btw, if you take the steal range trait from trickery then this is even more effective, as it’s not often used you can catch people out by engaging sooner than they think you can

6) Unless you’re fighting a melee class and you use the blind on stealth trait, refuging in a zerg is a horrible idea. Use shadow step first to put some distance between you and the zerg if possible. This also works in reverse though, you can actually put down the refuge behind you if you’re in stealth and people will swing their swords in the circle hitting nothing as you leg it.

As for ressing, use with extreme caution. The amount of thieves I’ve backstabbed because I see them go in for the res and just guessed where they are is plain silly.

7) People will blame you for abusing mechanics whether you are using them or not sometimes, I had one guy accuse me of perma stealth when I was using D/D (not possible), and another accuse me of HS spam when I was using S/D (just plain stupid). Just don’t worry about it

8) Again, what azerte said. My guild uses tanky mesmers/eles/rangers to draw fire (people looooove shooting at our ranger xD ) while the thieves burst and down things that are too busy to notice them. I don’t tend to stomp unless needed either, our tanks can do it far easier and with less risk. This is with an organise group with TS that plays together daily tho, in a pug group just stay out of the AoE’s and gank what you can :P

9) I have a 0/0/30/10/30 P/D build I use in WvW when I’m bored, 1500 range steal that dazes on a 22 sec cool down combined with shadow step, caltrops and runes of speed means things don’t get away often. You might enjoy that, it’s a total troll spec :P

10) I always have at least 10 points in acrobatics for the stealth-when-I-fall-off-stuff trait. It’s great for that sort of thing, plus if a smart alec pulls you off a tower wall you just disappear :P

Hopefully some of that helped :P Thief is such a great class to play, I love being able to dance around warriors while they rage at me xD Keep at it, and enjoy making people scream at their computers :P

That’s fair enough, I just wondered if this was a thing really. My guild doesn’t really care what class you are as long as you’re fun to roam with and know your class well, so this approach seemed very strange to me :P

It would be nice if all classes were equally valued, but I guess that’s just wishful thinking.

Hey all

I play thief on Ruins of Surmia, and I’ve been feeling rather unwanted as of late. A large number of the main guilds here are recruiting anything other than medium armour (which really speaks volumes about the state of those classes), some insisting that you can only bring a medium armour class to a raid with express permission from the leader. I’m not even going to start on how welcome we are in PvE raids.

I’m just wondering if this is a widespread thing really. WvW is the main place where we really shine, and it seems like we’re not even welcome there. Are others experiencing this?

I had some success duelling a bunker condi engi the other day, I was messing around with a 10/0/30/0/30 P/D condi build. I had to use the fact that he will sit in his turrets against him to win.

Try stealthing up with shadow refuge when he uses his supply crate, putting caltrops down under his turrets, then using thieves’ guild.
Stealth off the turrets when possible to confuse him & remove conditions, and alternate between sneak attack and shadow strike to keep condi pressure up while your thieves CC him.

You can also steal from him and use the goo with dancing dagger to apply stupid amounts of confusion to him, since this will bounce off the turrets for extra stacks. With the amount of skills they use and the lack of condi clean they have, this is ludicrously effective.

Most importantly, keep moving! Attack from different directions, and change tactics every few seconds to stop them predicting your movements. It’s still a very hard fight though, even when you play perfectly :/

The Hammer.5960:

Players will always whine about bags that get away. That’s fine and human nature.

People will always run if they are in an untenable situation. That’s just using your brain.

+1

A huge amount of players from all classes will start leeroying for the nearest tower/camp in WvW when they realise they’re losing, and yet thieves are the only ones that get hate for playing dirty xD

Keep the whole ‘honourable fight to the death’ thing to organised duels. In sPvP and WvW, all bets are off.

a t s e.9614:

I’m more rewarded without any skill playing hambow warr. Stealth truly is useless, only with the blind on stealth to deal with melees , but can’t do anything againsts necros. If you are so skilled can you post a vid of you beating a terror\dhummfire top tier necro? I wanna see that. Also , If you read my post correctly , I said I prefer stealthless builds like S\D which is getting nerfed . If there was less stealth , the class could be more balanced.

Saying that you’re more rewarded by playing a build that is widely acknowledged to be OP is a really bad reason for nerfing an already niche profession, especially for a mechanic that only really annoys players that can’t deal with it. Stealth is an integral part of the class and a major draw for many players and frankly, by not using it at all you’re pretty much playing with one hand tied.

Necros can be beaten, they just require you to be patient. A lot of necros are smart enough to plague form/death shroud after your initial burst, but then are dumb enough to just let the duration/life force expire as you kite around them in stealth. Same tactic works with engi elite, just kite and wait it out. Once that’s out of the way, they’re a lot easier to deal with.
If you’re in WvW, lure them into mobs. They’ll have a much harder time targeting you. Force them to fight on your terms, and use every dirty trick to beat them because they’ll be doing the exact same thing to you.

Switch.4892:

Evernessince.8035:

Yeah this pretty much makes my d/p SR build worthless in WvW. Not to mention I won’t get any initiative if I want to pop blinding powder to increase stealth length.

This pretty much just makes everything crappy…

I don’t see how d/p thiefs will be useless? They still have on demand stealth with a shadowstep, daze and blind field off cooldown. Its still pretty powerful and most probably will still be the strongest thief weaponset in WvW after dec 10.

I understand people who play D/P permastealth builds play it because they feel that rolling their faces across the keyboard is the most efficient way to succeed. You wont be able to gain long durations of stealth anymore (I still have no idea why such long durations of stealth is needed anyway) but you’ll still be able to come out on top on almost every encounter or escape it.

+1

I’ve been playing D/D a lot recently, and I’m enjoying the more aggressive play style atm. D/P will still be fine, and I will still use it in group fights as the interrupt and blinding field are great for small group stuff, I will just have to be more conservative with utilities to make sure I can escape

Gwalchgwn.1659:

Jugglemonkey.8741:

Gwalchgwn.1659:

Jugglemonkey.8741:

It will still be possible to perma stealth with D/P post patch.

Another possibility is (just theory crafting) to team up a party of x thieves who alternate with bp and clusterbomb. Has to be more than 2 though cause spamming bp and clusterbomb takes a lot of initiative.

Definitely, the other thief in my guild and myself do this quite a lot, it’s very effective It actually only needs 2 if you’re just stacking the max amount of stealth to attack something, and that’s with no ini regen. Just have to get timings right.

Pretty sure that hiding in a tower with 2 required at least ini-regen. That’s why I thought it had to be more than 2 after patch, cause of the ini-regen shaving. Even if pre-patch you could do it without, nothing says that after you can’t..

But yeah, will still definitely be a tactic.

Come to think of it, this may only be possible for my group because of Infusion of Shadow. I’m so used to running it that I forget it’s there lol :P

You’re probably right, after Dec this will need at least three people. I’m going to miss trolling people by hiding in their towers :’(

“1) lets get this straight the simple attributes to this skill are easy to understand so the fact that it keeps getting referenced like a 4 min CD is irrelevant considering the fact that you will almost never have to use it more then once in a fight which is the basis to this conversation in the first place.”

The cool down is relevant because it affects the balancing of the skill. Yes, it can only reasonably be used once in a fight, but it doesn’t do any real damage, limiting effective use to an escape. If your entire group focuses on damage with no CC, it’s gonna get away.

“2) I like how i ask a opinion on a skill from other players ( True shouldn’t have posted in thief forum should have been in cultural) and it immediately leads to ur bad u apparently don’t have a 30 sec immobilize or stun or daze to counter them from casting stealth and dash for a crazy distance in one elite (10sec cd on these 2 skills which is fair)and ive tried it. Its not that hard to use and abuse it like resetting the entire match against someone so making it another 4 min to pop it again is very easy! and not just for a theif but all other classes except necro’s they suck at running rofl”

You didn’t ask for an opinion, you called for a nerf, as you said below.

“3) Yes i did start with Nerf so ill give u that but a response like ur bad u suck so just get better and magically come up with a 30 sec cd to keep them down for the entire duration of the elite is laughable and hilarious but if u have a better answer to countering this affect then get better or waste all utilities on cd skills and run p/x or s/x and spam 2 to waste all my ini but at least they didn’t run away is not a good answer in my book so if anyone actual has some good advise besides ur bad then ur post would be greatly appreciated.

P.S. Since this get’s quoted enough might as well post it for everyone
Become the Snow Leopard
1/2 CT 240 sec CD (4min)
SKILLS
1. Frenzy “Slash repeatedly at foe.” 1 1/2 CT 0 CD
2. Growl "Let out a growl, weakening foes. " 1/2 CT 5 CD
3. Pounce "Leap onto foe [sic], crippling them. " 1 CT 10 CD
4. Dash “Hold down to dash at foes.” 3 3/4 CT 10 CD range= 1,600
5. Prowl “Use Snow Leopard’s grace to be unseen by your foes.” 0 CT 10 CD stealth= 5s
(My issue is not with stealth but range of Dash)[/quote]"

I don’t see anything in that set that breaks immobilise, a ranger could counter this by using their elite entangle, then using sick ‘em when they’ve been visible for a few seconds. If the range is the issue, try taking the steal range trait from trickery. If they use the dash then stealth, they are still in range of a short bow/shadowstep/steal combo, same as a warrior using greatsword. This means you have an opportunity to finish them.

Also, please consider punctuating your posts. People will be more willing to help if they can easily read the question :P

Gwalchgwn.1659:

Jugglemonkey.8741:

It will still be possible to perma stealth with D/P post patch.

Another possibility is (just theory crafting) to team up a party of x thieves who alternate with bp and clusterbomb. Has to be more than 2 though cause spamming bp and clusterbomb takes a lot of initiative.

Definitely, the other thief in my guild and myself do this quite a lot, it’s very effective It actually only needs 2 if you’re just stacking the max amount of stealth to attack something, and that’s with no ini regen. Just have to get timings right.

It is and it isn’t. You won’t be able to permanently chain stealth with a 0/30/30/10 build with just BP → HS anymore, but you will still have more than enough stealth to get away/kill things.

It will still be possible to perma stealth with D/P post patch. I tested this last week, more than possible although very unforgiving of mistakes. You will have to use utilities etc on rotation to ensure that you maintain stealth tho, which is how the dev’s wanted it to be.

It is a good change overall, since perma stealth will still be possible, but requires a very exact build rather than just 10 points in SA. The way it should be IMO

1) The guy sacrificed his elite skill, which are normally far superior, for a skill that just lets you escape, with a huge cool down. I don’t see the problem with this, especially since warriors hardly have problems running without this skill. Unless you’re really just complaining that someone denied you an easy kill by using an unconventional tactic, in which case that’s your problem.

2) Re-read your first post OP, you’re the only one crying here. Also, posting a cry-post about stealth on the thief forums is not going to get you any sympathy, especially when your complaint doesn’t involve a thief.

L2P.

Edited for spelling.

I’ve been lurking here for a couple of days now, and I’m glad I’m not the only thief who’s a little uncomfortable with these changes. I’ll try not to repeat things that have been said already, but there are a lot of posts so please forgive me if I do :P

I play D/P in WvW, with a standard 0/30/30/10/0 build (most of the time), and I’m guilty of being one of these perma-stealth thieves as I’m normally the scout for my guild group and using a (very) OP trait to help with my innate squishiness is not below me. That being said, I like the change to IoS.
When I fight someone instead of just goofing around doing zero damage (which is pretty easy to counter anyway if the opponent knows what they’re doing), I only heartseeker through BP once max to set up a backstab. Combat will largely feel the same post patch I think. Sure, I’ll miss being such a troll, but frankly I’ll become a better thief by being forced to come up with more inventive ways of escaping a group. It’s a good change, and it’s been done in a way that doesn’t adversely affect other builds, nicely done

Regarding sword and opportunist; I rarely use sword so can’t comment, I use 30 in CS for Hidden Killer and the stats, and at least a month passed after switching to D/P before I even realised opportunist gave me ini, so it’s always been an incidental perk to me.

What makes me uncomfortable is the passive nature of the changes to ini regen. The devs say they want to encourage thieves to stick around in a fight, to do that we need ACTIVE ini regen, so that way when that ele is leeroying away trying to heal we can use a couple signets (for example) to ensure we can definitely finish it off. Or, if things are not going so well, we can actually use short bow to escape when we swap to it instead of just sitting there looking pretty whilst some warrior lamps you with the better part of a tree.
The active management of ini is a major concern for all thieves looking to up their game, and for me is what makes the class so rewarding to play sometimes. Having this reduced in favour of a greater passive regen just encourages hit and run gameplay since we have to just strike and retreat, as if we press an attack we run a much greater risk of not being able to react to new threats due to low ini. Not to mention the ini traits becoming next to useless, which when so many traits are already underused because of bad/ineffective mechanics (you could replace the hard to catch trait with a picture of a cat doing the safety dance, and people would probably be happier) this doesn’t exactly help build diversity either. This seems contrary to what the devs are trying to achieve here.

I agree with Jon in that the ini regen increase IS a huge buff, but many thief builds need to know that ini is quickly available in a pinch. If they don’t have that, they’ll have to hang back from a fight more than ever.

Sorry, I rambled more than I thought :/