Guild Wars 2

A minor change to stealth would be a major change and nerf to thieves. And actually only Guardians and Elementalists share the lowest health pool with the Thief. All other professions start out much higher, proof:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Health

Honestly, look at what Guardians and Elementalists bring to the table for defense. They are pretty solid. Thieves just have stealth, you change it, you might as well remove thief from the game

Also your solution for increasing the reveal timer wouldn’t have any impact on permastealth so please, don’t revert back to your only solution as it has no impact on your problem of permastealth. So many people have told you this, I think it goes in one ear and out the other with you because you cannot be debated, questioned, argued, or reasoned with.

Considering thieves need to get behind you for a backstab, it’s kind of obvious where you need to place your AOE…

I tend to open with a few unloads and hit them with a headshot as soon as I see them going for the heal. After that I switch to S/D and either get them with an infiltrators strike followed up by a flanking strike, or i’ll precast flanking strike so it hits as I steal. It’s a very easy combo but requires a switch halfway through. I’ve also done the opposite and opened S/D infiltrators strike, auto attack, and swapped back to pistols after using shadow return.

I wouldn’t rely solely on P/P, but it’s a great set to have and use in any power/precision build.

Columba.9730:

No I don’t see the problem. Are you claiming that any minor change would decimate thieves? Why can other classes live with minor changes, but somehow thieves can’t?

Because any change to stealth isn’t minor. It’s how the class was developed.

I think P/P is very viable when used in combination with S/D, D/D, etc. I mostly roam solo in wvw and have rolled with PP/SD with very good success.

Columba.9730:

he has vitality. he has decent toughness. why does he deserve to die instantly? his objection is he never sees the character that kills him.

He deserves to die instantly because the thief did his job. He said he was in the middle of fighting at a tower, guess he was too distracted and the thief got the better of him…

Columba.9730:

Please set thieves equal to their state in spvp. that seems fair.

LOL, funny dude….

It’s pointless to give facts and any point of view to Columba. He won’t be happy until he can one shot thieves, or until thieves are removed from the game completely. Nearly 15 pages of the same anti-thief rhetoric. It’s obvious what his intentions are.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/members/Columba-9730/showposts

Kravick.4906:

In the grand scheme of things, yes, that is pretty minor. Personally, I’d make the adjustment so that heartseeker would only start doing bonus damage after someone is at 25% health and do its maximum damage after a person is below 10% health rather than 25% health. That, or keep it the way it is now but put a cooldown on the ability. As it is, its way to easy to heartseeker spam your way to victory.

Only do max damage after a person is below 10%? That’s just ridiculous. So an average person with 20k health at 10% would have 2,000 health. So your saying heartseekers max damage should never really exceed 2k based on a 20k health pool.

Can’t put a cooldown on a wep ability for thieves, we go off initiative. One or the other, not both.

If someone lets a thief heartseeker them to death then they should die.

Is it spammable? Yes
Is it a cheap way to fight? Yes
Is it avoidable? Yes
Can it be evaded? Yes
Can you stun, immobilize, CC? Probably Yes

Columba.9730:

thief and thief. unbeatable.

Thief/Thief is good in some cases but definitely not unbeatable.

Columba you’re hilarious… we’ve already discussed the method behind it, how it works, along with a video so it was easier for you to understand what exactly permastealthing is. What did you not understand about it?

Now your complaining cause a thief can hit you for 5k? HAHAHAHAHA!!!! If he’s hitting you, regardless of culling or not, he’s not stealthed anymore, he is able to be targeted and killed. There are probably plenty of reasons you don’t see him but you blame it all on your favorite word “permastealth”. He could be shadow stepping, shadow returning, using infiltrators strike/return, etc. Just because they aren’t standing in front of you waiting for you to notice them doesn’t mean “they are permastealthed omg!!!!”

So, just because other classes and their rhythms have changed means that the thief class has to change? The thief class along with stealth is fine and obviously working as intended. Should they fix culling, yes? But people like you will still QQ about it.

Anyway, just hopped on to feed a troll some dessert. Enjoy… It’s leftovers from our previous discussions…

There’s a video in this thread that details the P/P – S/D build I run with. Build, gear, etc are at the end of the video. It’s for wvw but can adapt to pve.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/P-P-S-D-WvW-Video-Something-Different/

Panacea.4927:

I suggest to remove Columba as he is totally useless and with that he isnt needed and can freely be removed!

Lol, can I “+1” this somehow?

Columba.9730:

I don’t see why slightly increasing cool down timers for stealth will wreck every thief. Anet makes changes all the time, and classes aren’t wrecked. I think the principle of no permastealth is fair and doesn’t require a huge sacrafice on the part of thieves. On the one hand you state that perma stealth isn’t useful, and on the other you claim that a small adjustment to prevent it will suddenly wreck the class. I am trying to reconcile these positions. If you read my history, you’d see me clearly state that nothing else about the thief should be touched until stealth is brought into line.

You may think losing perma stealth isn’t a big deal, but non thiefs do think it would help. Wouldn’t it be wise and reasonable to do that before heavy nerfs are demanded by the player base? I don’t think heavy nerfs are good for the game, so I am trying to help.

Wake up… increasing cool down timers for stealth will do absolutely nothing to a permastealth build since they can’t attack to maintain their perma stealth. Just like the vid I showed you. To maintain “permastealth” a thief pops black powder, heartseeks through it 3 times and then does it all over again. He never once attacks anything because he will lose his stealth. The timers in place are fine since once the thief attacks he is not stealthed and cannot stealth for the duration of the timer. The issue apparently is culling. That is nothing that can be fixed by nerfing any one individual class. So there’s your answer. You can adjust the timer to 10 seconds, even 30 seconds and you will still have perma stealth thieves that do nothing but pop black powder and heartseek through them. Again, your solution is flawed, pointless, and does nothing to a perma stealth build.

I care because your solution for nerfing it affects every thief with every build not just thieves that choose to utilize perma stealth builds. Also, you don’t fall into the “most reasonable people” category here. You are clearly anti thief, anti stealth, anti thief dps, anti everything about the thief when it comes to wvw. We all see your post history, just anti thief garbage that you keep hashing over and over again.

Columba.9730:

my point is that it’s useless to argue with me, since my only goal is to prevent perma stealth since I deem it imbalancing. You don’t want perma stealth anyway.

I am absolutely not trying to troll you. We have legitimate disagreements, and principled debate is constructive. the developers can review and make their decisions accordingly.

He even admits it’s useless to argue with him, and his only goal is to prevent perma stealth. We pointed out how useless a real permastealth build is, we even debunked his own arguments towards perma stealth. He is the true definition of a troll. There is no arguing with him as he doesn’t understand facts, or others points of view. One track mind, with the goal of nerfing thief to the ground so he can feel special when he wins against one finally.

Columba.9730:

so if it’s not useful, then why are you arguing so much against changes to stealth, Lol?

So now your trying to shift this to stealth mechanics and not just permastealth builds? Why don’t we focus on the “permastealth god mode build” as you’ve stated before? I really want to understand why you think someone popping black powder and heartseeking through it 3 times, repeatedly, all while not attacking is god mode?

I never said a D/P build is useless… If you paid any attention I implied that popping black powder and heart seeking through it three times was a way to achieve perma stealth. I also stated it was pointless to do that continuously for a whole minute to gain 10-11 seconds of stealth.

Just look at his post history Rylark, pages of posts against thieves. He won’t be happy till thieves are nerfed beyond play, or eliminated from the game.

rylark.3418:

Columba.9730:

So we’ve moved from perma stealth is impossible, to well it’s possible but it’s not useful? I am just trying to clarify the current disagreements.

I already told you that you proved me wrong, do you want a cookie? I said before, even if it’s possible you won’t do any damage.

LOL, yes, give him a QQ cookie with some troll sprinkles on top.

Columba.9730:

So we’ve moved from perma stealth is impossible, to well it’s possible but it’s not useful? I am just trying to clarify the current disagreements.

To clarify the current disagreements, I never said it was impossible just not useful. Since I posted it was possible, no one else has stated it is impossible. So let’s stick to the disagreement of it being impractical here and state your facts.

You stated decent thieves will move away from the smoke… That’s completely false as they have to heartseek through it three times to get any kind of perma stealth.

You stated they can “wear enemies down” How? by their enemies getting bored and tired of standing there watching the black powders pop up?

You say they can rez friends without being targeted. As I recall, It took the guy in the video about a full minute to stack up 10-11 seconds of stealth. That can be done in any build with any combination of SR, CnD, Blinding Powder. And if there is a corpse that’s being stealth rezd, the obvious thing to do is attack on the corpse since you know the thief is there.

You say “in taking camps, you can stay out of sight when enemies come” Duh, so can anyone else if they go far enough and wait. Do you think a thief is hiding right in the center of the camp or something? Not likely. And again, if they are close enough for the black powder to be spotted (and it is obvious) there’s your clue not to leave the camp unattended until you take him out.

Columba.9730:

Panacea.4927:

Because some suddenly up popping smoke screens and black powders are totally not obvious…

actually not obvious or helpful. Any decent thief moves away from said smoke, and it’s not easy to see. they should make it as glaringly obvious as portals if not more obvious. Lol wth 1900 toughness and 3k armor, backstab hits me for 4500+. NO idea what you are referring to with 1.5k .

They can’t move away from it Columba… They have to heartseek through it three times to maintain perma stealth. As far as hiding in a castle/keep that’s kind of far stretched since we haven’t heard any complaints of that happening, only observations that it could happen. Even if it did, it will be blatantly obvious what the thief is doing when he’s popping black powder.

That would be your clue to target the black powder area with AOE and get close enough to screw up his heartseeker. Problem solved and since this build lacks DPS it’s easy to take them down.

You can perma stealth with D/P by dropping a black powder and heartseeking through it 3 times. Big deal, who cares, what’s the point? So a thief can permastealth by doing this repeatedly in one spot without attacking, causing damage, or doing anything else but spamming black powder and heartseeking through it. How does this hurt and affect your game play? How does this make a thief OP?

Here’s a vid of a permastealth D/P and how he does it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSbw8Cpy-3s

So this is what you guys are all complaining about? The guy can’t even attack or he will lose his permastealth. With his build he probably hits like a wet noodle, and you complain non stop because he can pick a spot, cast black powder and heartseek through a few times to get perma stealth all while not attacking, not hurting your game play, and not doing anything but stealthing? And notice, after nearly a full minute of spamming this after he started out with a SR, he had a whopping 11 seconds of stealth built up… The trade off, it took him a whole minute to do it… Not really worth it, but I guess it’s worth QQ about right?

Not bad, I go 20/30/0/20/0 P/P and use S/D as my alt wep set. Really frees up the build more.

Face it Columba, the game is not balanced around WvW and it never will be. If you want balance, go to spvp/tpvp.

Kasama.8941:

Laika.8795:

Cool. And what about adjusting our abilities? Because, outside of heart seeker (highly situational) and pistol whip, NONE of our abilities are designed for damage. The whole thief dynamic is to acquire stealth and apply damage, everything else is a means to that end.

You’re suggesting a rework that requires all thieves to run GC builds to front load as much damage as we can, because otherwise we are wholly ineffective.

I feel like no one really understands the plight of the auto attack dependent thief outside of stealth.

Who cares about design, when the weapons deal plenty of damage. It’s a Thief, not an Assassin. The point is to deal consistent damage, with some burst in between, while evading attacks from your foe. Stealth skills are just a way to keep the pressure on your opponent consistent, to make up for the damage you lose while you’re in stealth. The Thief was never meant to be totally dependent on stealth, but I can see how someone could think that. The Thief is designed to rely on movement, with stealth being a tool to further improve mobility and survivability.

Dual.8953:

What do suggest for the non-burst sets that live off their stealth skills for attack and survival? Sure you can buff survival, but they’ll still lack thier ability to be offensively effective.

Well I suggest you learn to play without relying on them, of curse. Just like all other professions, the Thief has different weapon sets, for different situations. It’s mostly in the third skill. Unload is the classic burst skill, that pairs well with the vulnerability from Body Shot. But if you put in an off-hand dagger instead, you suddenly get a much more defensive weapon set, that’s meant to keep the distance to a foe. Say, if someone want’s to attack you with a melee weapon, it’s probably a good idea to have a weapon that prevents him from coming close to you. But if he has a ranged weapon instead, you have your burst weapon set to bring him down. Luckily, you can have two weapon sets, meaning you can use both options.

Why don’t you remove your main damage dealing attacks and your best defenses and learn to play your own class that way. While it is a possibility, it’s not what every thief wants to do. And it is very limiting when you play a thief without stealth.

Avariz.8241:

This thread is so long. I can not properly refere to earlier points brought up. So I just say replace the thief stealth invisibility with degree of transparance similar to the mesner’s phantasmal. The degree of transparance should be trade off from speed, quickness, and burst. For example higher the speed, quickness, and burst rating a thief has lower the transparance and higher the visibility. IE thieves should not be 100% invisible. If they are 100% invisible then they should have trade-off of minium speed, quickness, and burst. Of cause the trade off point could be a fixed constant on a sliding scale or a moving point along the sliding scale depending on what the thief’s action is at the time.

Transparency instead of stealth has been hashed over so many times and it always ends in the same conclusion. That conclusion is that it won’t work. Since you haven’t taken the time to read the multiple posts on it I won’t bother to enlighten you with every little deatail, and instead let you do the research yourself. The reason it won’t work is simple, stealth is our main defensive ability, you take away stealth to any degree, you might as well just squash the profession in it’s entirety.

Victory.2879:

Mug made into an elite with a 240 second cooldown, so steal and mug no longer work together, either you steal a skill OR you can use mug to cause a reduced 4k crit damage hit.

Heartseeker made into 6 ini, 15 second cooldown skill.

CnD cooldown increased to 30 seconds.

Using any attack reveal you and you cannot restealth for 5 seconds, any attempt to do so with waste that skill and put it on cooldown. Includes all weapon types and skills.

You are revealed when with 400 range of any player and remain revealed until out of that range.

Any attack that is dodged/blocked causes your stealth to be disabled for 5 seconds.

Now you are like most other classes that have long cooldown on their main attacks.

Cannot attack more than twice per second.

Make the above changes and I’d actually want to play thief in wvw as it would take skill to play well.

I couldn’t stop laughing when I ready this. Thieves use initiative, not cooldowns… Also, are you suggesting it doesn’t take skill to play a thief? Wrong…………….. So basically what you’re suggesting is that they just delete the thief profession altogether. Get real, learn to counter and play against thieves instead of raging on here cause you don’t take the time to figure out your own class.

jan.9745:

frans.8092:

jan.9745:

… we just want to see you a lot of the times dont shy to us we are your friend. Thats the only thing want.

It’s hard to make out exactly what you are suggesting, but I am pretty sure you are no friend.

Hitting stuff ends stealth, a long duration stealth on a large cooldown will eliminate it as combat tool, including all the little benefits that replace some of the boons other classes get. Without those benefits, without the boons that other classes get, and without the damage from stealth skills this means every thief could as well be deleted. Suggesting we delete our character automatically puts you in the not-a-friend category.

Im am your friend., 1st of all we need you in a group or party before we engage to battle w/out you we die to all the black thiefs in the battleground., we just want to make the same venom kill there own venom. And the rules are we need to be near at you like 3000 range to activate that bufs.. If your white thief die, the bufs will no longer effective., so we need to revive you a.s.a.p it means thief will contribute a big role for the battle.,
And because we need your help., you need our help too. Why because you can’t capture a supply camp, tower or fortress. It means team work. Sounds good right?

It sounds like horse manure to be honest… If you want to see us so badly, take a screen shot before getting stomped next time.

In all reality I don’t see that idea as one that holds any ground. I’ve stated my reasons, so have others in this thread. It’s just not viable any way you look at it. Every class has their own role to fill in GW2… You don’t like the role thieves play. I appreciate good ideas, but this clearly isn’t one of them.

So if you have a “white thief” in your group that gives you buffs, you’re basically immune to any other opposing thief with your idea. So you suggest having a thief in your group to be able to see a thief 100% of the time which would basically give you super powers over all enemy thieves. I would propose a major damage reduction or an increase in the damage you take if you have this buff active. After all, if you want to see us, there has to be some risk involved.

In all reality, your proposal would nerf thieves to the ground as our stealth would be useless. It would eliminate backstabs and sneak attacks, not to mention give us no defensive skills. The Shadow Arts tree would have to be completely reworked to account for your proposal, and the bottom line is that it’s completely unrealistic. I’m all for hearing people out, but this isn’t a fix, it’s a gigantic advantage for everyone else and turns thieves into a useless class.

It’s mostly likely caused by having auto attack enabled. What happens is that you are attacking the instant you complete the steal, and that reveals you. Turn off auto attack and I bet your problem will be solved.

If you have mug, you’ll start auto attacking directly after you steal too.

Lol, that’s kind of funny if you think about it. Good thing it didn’t do that when you went for a back stab or something. I could only imagine the wtf look if you somehow back stabbed yourself.

I’ve had a great time with my PP/SD build in WvW. Haven’t tried it out in sPvP yet. Here’s a link to the thread:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/P-P-S-D-WvW-Video-Something-Different/

There are some good examples of how I play it, along with build/gear/etc in the video on the first post.

I think having D/P instead of S/D would work great too. If only we had an extra utility slot right?! I could see this build working with D/P just as well with a few adjustments. One of the main reasons I chose S/D was infiltrators strike. It gives you a great opportunity to jump back to your starting position, switch to pistols and unload like crazy. But with D/P you could keep shadow step as a utility and make it work.

Irenic Eremite.1650:

tom.7468:

you’re idea is to make stealth only visible for theifs? that will make things way unbalanced on a side note theifs usually know better how to counter stealth anyway.

Yes. I’m proposing stealth would have no effect on other thieves.

I admit it would change the game balance, but that’s the point of this thread. I’m interested to hear how you think it would be less balanced than the current situation where nobody has a chance of seeing a thief with a perma-stealth build.

I really appreciate constructive criticism, but dismissing something out-of-hand without any reasoning is just frustrating.

Cheers and Good Playing,

I.E.

I don’t think your proposal is very sound. The vast majority of people who have a problem with stealth aren’t thieves. Your proposal would make it to where thieves would have a huge advantage against every other profession in wvw/pvp. People would really be crying out that thieves were OP. Plus, it would be giving thieves a huge competitive edge over all other professions that most would find unfair.

Although your idea is better than completely nerfing stealth like most suggest, I just don’t think it’s reasonable in the fact it would only affect thieves and the other professions would still complain about it, but complain even more because thieves would only be allowed to see other thieves.

Also, it would instantly wipe out any chance of a P/D thief fighting any other type of thief since P/D thieves need to stealth in order to get off their quick attack.

When I am PP/SD flanking strike is one of my go to moves to down someone. Infiltrators strike then an instant flanking strike will usually put someone down after I’ve harassed them with the pistols enough. I use a sigil of paralyzation on my sword that gives me an extra second on daze so hitting flanking strike usually works great unless they broke the daze.

Mystogan.4157:

Oh so in spvp, there are no stats on armour or weapons?

I believe that is correct

I can get about 20+ stacks on mobs in a matter of seconds. Caltrops, Death Blossom x 3, switch to P/D, hit blinding powder and sneak attack. Mobs melt very fast with little to no effort with the 0/0/30/20/20 build I’m using. I’ve also been using it for WvW too and it’s pretty solid.

Well that’s a bummer… I got a lot of good laughs from that. The most memorable moment to me was when the dude with the accent said “Poor little cheater, his mommy didn’t love him enough”

I like to max out traits in the Shadow arts tree and pick up Shadow’s Rejuvenation. It does heal you each second of stealth. If you use venoms, you can also pick up leeching venom’s that will steal health when you trigger a venom. 20 in Acrobatics and you can pick up Assassins reward. That heals you per initiative spent.

If taking full 30 in SA though, you will be in stealth for 4 seconds instead of 3 so you would get extra heals and that couples great with Hide in Shadows which also puts you in stealth and gives regen. And if you have any +healing on your gear that definitely adds up when you CnD.

That might not be optimal for a GC build though. But it tends to keep me very alive as I work my way through 100% map completion. I’m running D/D and D/P with a 0/0/30/20/20 condition build.

Columba.9730:

a thief in our guild claims that he can stay perma stealthed, has 100% crit, 16k health, 3k armor and 2800 attack. he agrees that he can pretty much get into a full group and take out an enemy, escaping unscathed. so yes, culling allows thieves to get full stealth without speccing for it.

Well oZii, you have to understand that Columba clearly has no idea about thieves let alone thief traits, uses, or builds, nor does he care to learn them. But then again, he believes what he is told by another thief only when it suits his purpose to bring negativity to our boards and our profession.

With the BS this thief in your guild is feeding you Columba, it’s no wonder you are so negative towards thieves. Roll a thief so you’ll understand how a thief functions instead of just speculating and qqing about it.

Columba.9730:

That’s just it. Under the current set of mechanics, thieves get all the rewards for zero risk.

You are so clueless about the thief class it’s getting to be ridiculous… Far from ZERO risk I can tell you… When I go P/D 1v2 or more I’m hitting anywhere from 2-3 buttons per second just about the whole fight and that’s not counting dodge. If I slip up just once, i’m finished. High Risk – High Reward… Thief class….

My warrior on the other hand is a breeze to play and at most times feels like a welcomed vacation after being on my thief for a while. So, can you explain your “thieves get all the rewards for zero the risk” statement a little more in depth for us. And I don’t mean for you to simply say “uhhh, perma stealth and culling” since those are the only two things you can seem to say about thieves.

LOL, that’s just awesome!

Yes, I’ve used it in fractals a few times. You can just change some of the traits around without having to respec, or you can keep it as is.

Question… Are you specd to “blind on stealth”? Just curious if that would stop the channel or not when you go stealth.

This thread is becoming a waste of space… Same argument over and over… “Thieves are bad because they perma stealth and because of culling…”

Get used to it… It’s wvw, not spvp. You want balance, don’t come to wvw. And please, don’t come back with “It’s not fun, it’s not fair”, or something else that isn’t in our control….

Ron.4920:

You probably think you’re such an awesome player don’t you? Well when a game allows 1 player to beat 5 something is wrong. You can talk about all your skill all you want to. That is what most of you guys do, either boast yourself up or cut the other person down. This video is enough to show me that not only is this class broken but this whole game’s pvp is also as a result. How exactly does allowing a player to effectively have a pause button during a fight not seem unbalanced? I’m talking about stealth. Don’t bother replying to me, I won’t read it, tired of insults.

The class isn’t broken… It’s wvw… If people want balanced and fair etc… go to sPVP or something, but don’t bash the OP’s play cause you can’t do what he does so automatically you say it’s not fair. It’s wvw, and wvw isn’t balanced around 1v1 or 1v2 or even 1v3+ fights. It’s balanced around objectives and points. If I can keep a group of 5+ occupied (win or lose) I consider it a win cause they could have just as easily went and capd a supply camp or something. /Cheer for the OP and his vid on a good show with great skill.

Columba.9730:

thieves hit me far harder than warriors ever do. it’s easy to avoid warrior high dps shots. thieves should have a stealth debuff after attacking.

You’re in denial… I don’t see thieves one shotting 80’s for 18k+ like my warrior does with killshot. They are probably light armored GC builds but regardless, thieves can’t do that. And it’s a ranged ability that is so easily followed up with volley for another 10k+…

I don’t feel the damage is a problem. If my thief could pump out the amount of damage my warrior could, then I would agree with you. But that’s not the case.

I mostly ran with berserkers in that vid. But you could replace the rings/ammys with some more vitality or toughness if you feel you need it. The build does give you some great survivability even in full berserkers.

Infiltrators strike. Always use it. It allows you to shadow step to your target, and shadow return when things get nasty. It’s also a good idea to switch to pistols once you shadow return and start bursting down with unload. I really started to love this build when I started using this ability more often.

Use CnD on your S/D to go stealth for escapes.

The 20 in acrobatics allows you good mobility with constant dodging.

Use your Blinds on PP and Signet of Shadows, it makes your target miss their next outgoing attack.

Shadow Refuge – Good escape/heal and if timed right you can pull off two free sneak attacks.

See, the build was built with mobility/survivability/damage in mind.

Just aim for bettering your gear and improving your DD play. Shoot for full berserker exotics. As far as attributes focus on Power/Precision/Crit Dmg