Guild Wars 2

Margrave.2071:

Thank you guys for the advise!

Thanks Maugetarr.6823, that sounds good

Glad to help a new(ish) thief!

Margrave.2071:

I’m a pve player. Not into pvp personally. I made this topic to try to understand what I’m doing wrong. I’ve tried all of the weapon combos, and I’ve leveled every other class to 80. I’m an alt-o-holic, so I have to get this thief to 80 before I can start to work on the new class in the expansion. I just swapped all my gear, which was all + cond. dmg for +toughness gear, and so far it seems to have helped. I’m currently level 55, and my build is 2,1,2,0,0. The best weapon combo I can come up with so far is just D/D.

I know it’s me, I was just saying how it feels to play the class to me. Once I get him to 80, I will most likely move to a different class to play until the expansion is released.

I was hoping for tips, builds, techniques to try out…. from someone….

To me, stealth feels like a burden to try to use.

So the thief benefits little from passive stats relative to other classes due to a number of things, but largely due to lack of defensive/supportive boons.

You should try to prioritize your stats as:

Power>Crit damage>Precision>Vitality (perhaps switching crit damage and precision depending on your exact build)

You can prioritize these because what the thief lacks in passive traits/defense, they make up for in largely active defense or ways to augment their active defenses (see feline grace). Your survivability comes from dodges or weapon evades. Against large numbers of trash mobs, S/P works excellently because of the cleaves and evades. D/D works well against single targets (such as bosses) where there are fewer attacks coming at you so they can be dodged regularly.

Gear into power based gear, and make up for those lack of defenses with your traits. If this is initially too difficult to do, start out with PVT gear and keep switching it slowly to zerker gear as you become more comfortable with the class’ mechanics.

Pandaman.4758:

I think the autoattack animation could stand to have a little variation to make it feel more brutal, a single animation makes the hammer look like it doesn’t have any weight to it. It doesn’t have to be an exaggerated stagger, but something to give that sense the character needs to shift their balance and grip to reverse the swing.

Currently it looks like they’re either swinging a light pole or bouncing it off an invisible wall every time they swing.

Yeah, this is exactly what I was thinking. They need to swing through because stopping such a large hammer head like that would be pretty difficult.

I think it would be cool if you ended up doing more of a smooth swing coming back around over your head. If you’ve watched a charr swing a GS during auto attacks (the first 2 of 3) or part of 100b, you should understand what I mean. That’s a lot of mass that you’re not physically hitting something with, so it seems like it would make more sense to keep the momentum up and have that ghostly hammer just fly out during the initial part of the swing.

If you look at the link Bruno showed you can see it’s just an awkward stop in mid air. Channeling that momentum would be far more efficient in combat.

I’m surprised I haven’t seen more suggestions for ele.

When I play PvE, i switch off between thief and ele. If a group doesn’t have an ele, that’s what I go to first. At first you might think neither is particularly tanky, but both have excellent endurance regeneration allowing you to not get one-shot since you’ll likely have a dodge ready. Ele has the added benefit of buffing the group nicely with 12 stacks of might and ~1 minute of fury when traited and used correctly. For a newer player you can build slightly more tanky and still be welcome as you’ll boost your group’s overall stats.

Butch.4957:

Gamblit.5041:

Butch.4957:

Gamblit.5041:

BFMV.3198:

After watching the revenant and how kitten cool it looks, I will be making one, I reakon we should get either offhand sword, focus or a staff, that has cool kitten like displacement and all that.

post some ideas

In the trailer they have shown a Thief with a Rifle. So there you have it.

The interesting thing about that Rifle is that it has a knife attached to it. They could have picked any other normal Rifle, but they didn’t. Perhapes it’s a hint that the Rifle will be a melee weapon.

Dude, there is no garuntee that was a thief with a rifle. Remember that all medium armor classes have the same armor. It looks the same on just about everyone (Charr and Asura excluded). The trailer was not showing what each class would have, just a teaser at some of the things available with HoT.

You must have missed it. They have showned 9 Character in the trailer, one for each proffesion.
Engineer was showned with the Hammer.
Ranger was shown with the Staff.
The third Leather wearing character was shown with the Rifle = Thief.

Then the Devs confirmed on the forums that Each class will only get 1 new weapon. So Thief = Rifle.

So, did they show elementalist with their new weapon? Did they specify which heavy armor character was guardian or warrior and of them show one using a different weapon? As far as I saw, no. Just because we saw engi (fairly obvious I grant) and confirmed ranger, does not mean the other leather armor character was thief. I am sorry, but I will refuse to believe that was a thief with rifle untill dev’s tell us so in writing. Besides, the rifle just does not fit with the core design concepts of the character. The longbow would be a much better fit and if that were announced, I could happily get behind that. Yet everyone thinks we will be getting a LOUD, NON-STEALTHY rifle. In the main page for the thief on the wiki it says,
“Experts at stealth and surprise, thieves can move through the shadows, vanish into thin air, or steal items from their opponents and use them as weapons. Thieves practice an agile, acrobatic fighting style, which can make them very hard to hit.”

That just does not sound like a rifle to me.

….. but pistols fit?

Kurow.3076:

yolo swaggins.2570:

…And everyone wonders why this profession’s level of diversity is poor…. get a clue lol.

What are you babbling about?!?

Some people thinking of thieves as rogue archetype has nothing to do with the professions lack of skill build diversity.

That stems from the fact that thieves ONLY have 3.5 land weapons to choose from.

The fact that ANet has not done anything to adjust their only ranged DPS weapon set (P/P) doesn’t help them either. There’s no need for rifle for the thief class because they have enough mobility to not NEED a 1200 ranged weapon. Only BAD players NEED that 1200 ranged weapon.

There’s a lot better things ANet can do with the class and its initiative system itself, while altering the steal system for specializations.

PS: P/D’s “condi spam” is laughable. Spamming a single condi will only win you fights against bad players.

While the necessity of 1200 range is a matter of opinion, I’d wager that P/P hasn’t been changed for the fact that any change to it other than Unload would affect one of three other possible builds (P/D, D/P, S/P). It would be a lot easier to introduce a two handed DPS weapon (rifle or longbow) that they wouldn’t have to balance against all the other single handed weapons that thief has.

We’ll have to see what else the specialization brings besides a new weapon.

Yeah, sometimes it’s frustrating hitting a heavily armored target and watching it do nothing relatively speaking, at the same time I hit other squishies for 8.5k in pvp still occasionally. I think the only thing that they could do is remove the double damage from behind and bring back Deep Wound from guild wars 1. That would improve BS against heavy armor, but decrease effectiveness against light armor. Deep wound could just stack intensity up to a max of 35% of their health with 3 stacks. First stack 20%, 2nd stack 10%, 3rd stack 5%. Counterplay is that a condi removal essentially gives players back a large portion of their health. Pairs nicely with poison too.

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Deep_Wound

Thief – ultimate hills defender

@Branden Gee

Any chance you guys are working on oculus support? I don’t have one, but that would be pretty cool to throw something like that in with this overhaul.

Looks great, can’t wait!

Can we use this clip for when people say stealth/thief is OP/uncounterable?

Azure The Heartless.3261:

Ehhh.. Feline grace is useful, Quick pockets marginally so, but the other options are so much better across the board that there’s no real reason to actually run full acrobatics.

Could just take feline grace/fleet shadow, be good, and not need the rest.

Feline grace, vigorous recovery, and withdraw can cover the weaknesses of D/D, although I agree with you and never go past feline grace anymore.

Llama.

Zero Day.2594:

the orbweaver just looks like a section of a keyboard…
:/ I’m sticking to my G15 (old kitten , and I don’t use the 18 macro keys in games) keyboard and my G9x mouse. Logitechs are nice… If they ever die on me, might try razer stuff or SteelSeries (sensei mouse).

It sorta is with 20 keys, a joystick, and 2 thumb buttons. I use the joystick for movement and all the other skills (1-0, call target, etc) are tied to the keys. I never touch my standard QWERTY though I guess i should have said.

Zero Day.2594:

Jana.6831:

Zero Day.2594:

… I don’t understand how people can play clicking on their skills…

Well, it was enough for ranger who I mained until I created my thief.
And I do have some advantages from that time – the biggest advantage to me would be that I would be able to play with my keyboard alone but I can’t.

Just get one of those weird and not comfortable looking mice with 20 thumb buttons (like Razer Naga, but there are worse…). :| Then you will be able to play with 1 hand and have one free hand to do stuff… stuff… god the internet as ruined me…

I never touch my keyboard while playing

http://assets.razerzone.com/eeimages/products/17832/razer-orbweaver-gallery-06.png
http://assets.razerzone.com/eeimages/products/13785/razer-naga-2014-right-03.png

I use my ele unless there is already one as it raises party DPS with minimum 12 (area) might and ~1 minute of fury (after combat is over).

If there’s already an ele, those aforementioned buffs work great for helping you out.

(I agree with drawing guy who already gave more complete reasons why)

Thief got quite a few votes for both “having as a duo partner” and “dislike fighting against.”

Interesting split there.

Simon.3794:

i don’t know why people want rifle, it’s like they forgot what is a thief and reason they pick this class..

Well, if the specialization were an assassin or a scout, thematically a rifle would fit pretty well. I’m just sitting here hoping for not torch, focus, mace, or scepter. I have some rifle skins I like as well (while making the predator).

Orcinus Orca.8627:

Definitely off-hand sword. I want a true Blademaster/Blade Dancer/Swashbuckler/etc.

Maybe we’d get a proper deathblossom then.
(I think we’re getting rifle though)

Gamblit.5041:

BFMV.3198:

After watching the revenant and how kitten cool it looks, I will be making one, I reakon we should get either offhand sword, focus or a staff, that has cool kitten like displacement and all that.

post some ideas

In the trailer they have shown a Thief with a Rifle. So there you have it.

The interesting thing about that Rifle is that it has a knife attached to it. They could have picked any other normal Rifle, but they didn’t. Perhapes it’s a hint that the Rifle will be a melee weapon.

There was a long thread about that scene in the HoT discussion section. Some argued that that could be a seconds engi which is possible, but I tend to think not. There’s a scene later that shows 9+ (possible) PC, so you’d think there would be one of each profession there. There were 2 medium armor characters not including the known engi, and unless druid is getting rifles as well, that’s either a second engi or a thief.

Grimwolf.7163:

Shiyo.3578:

It’d be nice if acrobatics had a grandmaster trait.

The stability change might make the new one pretty crazy, if it gets a fair duration with 1 charge.

They took my idea of changing this trait to stability on dodge and gave it to the Revenant. ….. T.T

Since you like P/P and dislike stealth, I would recommend S/P. It’s burst is stealthless and has a nice evade tied to it. In that sense, it’s a little like close combat P/P.

66XXX has almost no survivability tied to it though. If you really want to get into an acrobatics style thief, I would say go at least XXX36 picking up feline grace, vigorous recovery, and bountiful theft. While your experience with acro hasn’t been anything special, once you stack vigor on top of feline grace, it becomes a lot better than just an additional dodge. For those last 5 points, I like spending them in DA myself. That will get you the power boost from the line as well as the +10% damage with the 5 trait.

For utilities, I really like shadowstep, signet of agility, and devourer venom. Devourer venom is great for making sure the whole pistolwhip lands.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fZAQRAsa6al0Mp0pFOxrJ8PNxLh4960v1dRg+2C-TVSBwAmVCG5gAcT9HsK/Iu/Ae9DLeAAaOCAAOBABAOA+tv9tvB+95ff+3nLFggKjA-w

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Maugetarr.6823:

It’s not optimal really, but I really enjoy 5/0/0/3/6 regardless of game mode. It works with both D/D and D/P.

Same build here(50036), but I optimize more towards raw power and survivability so I pick up a combination of Zerker/Valk/Soldier armor pieces. Not to mention, it is a budget build.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fZAQRAoa6an0HStT27EeOB9TmolQ8+9956+IQfVB-TFSBwA4UpI5+DmVCeV5HK9D5UXRzJBAwTAgUACK0C-w

That’s pretty similar. I have some soldier pieces on one of my other thieves, but they run with traveller’s runes . I tried vamp runes once and they just didn’t fit my playstyle. I also run SB for the mobility because I run D/D more often than D/P, which is why my traits revolve around high vigor uptime as well. It’s good to see someone else using 50036 though!

It’s not optimal really, but I really enjoy 5/0/0/3/6 regardless of game mode. It works with both D/D and D/P.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fZAQNAoaVl0Mp0pFOxrJ8PNRLh4972z19Rg++C-TVSBABPcEAoU9HzUCGxhAALlfEt/Ae6DW4BAAwJAIAwBwv9tv/G45nf+5nfuff+3n/95SBIoyI-w

Roam with what you like.

Kurow.3076:

Yes, slow and taunt will kill thieves.

They are far too squishy with no access to Aegis or Protection, and their stability gain is gated behind a trait (which isn’t even that good).

This game offers an overabundance of condis and ccs, with not enough condi clears and stun breakers.

I doubt there’ll be more stuns coming at you per encounter though. At most these will be the same frequency of fear and quickness.

Roy Cronacher.1576:

Nike.2631:

Roy Cronacher.1576:

The skills on the right half of your bar are tied to the legend which you are currently invoking.

Lets see if I can phrase this unambiguously:

When I am invoking Bob the Mighty, will I have a Bob-themed pool of skills to choose from when filling out my right-hand tray, or does channeling Bob the Mighty give me an absolutely specific set of 5 skills without variation from any other Revenant invoking Bob?

I realize the answer may be different for buttons 6 and 0 than it is for buttons 7, 8, & 9.

That is not set in stone yet and something we are deciding still.

I know you just stated this is something that you’re still deciding on, but I have to say, having your 6-0 (or a subset of that) based on who you’re channeling seems like it would severely limit the build choices and make it a predictable class with the only surprise being the legend swap. What if each skill were like glyph of storms in that the exact effect changed based on the attunment (channel) but generally did similar things. 2 legends and a single weapon doesn’t seem like enough to make the class feel like your own in terms of combat.

A OK.8276:

My time traveler idea for lore for the Revenant is looking better and better haha.

Chronomancers are probably sending new revenants back in time to get training before a battle that they’re needed for.

scarletrose.1790:

So there is no stealth “button”, just skills that allow you to go into stealth for a short period while you set up an attack? I always enjoyed being able to sneak around a room full of high level mobs and not be seen.

You can chain together skills like shadow refuge, smokescreen + clusterbomb, and blinding powder to do this for groups up to 5, but there’s no passive way to remain in stealth in this game.

DeceiverX.8361:

Skelk is probably better off at 30-40s as a leech venom thief would be able to heal for like 10k every 16s which is crazy :P

As for that substantial of cooldown reductions… I’m not sure if it’s practical. The utility spots are pretty important for effects like SS and for many people, refuge, so I’m unsure if they’d get used or would really contribute to the builds themselves since poison is currently readily available on D/x and shortbow, devourer is overall way better, and P/D already has torment stacking which still begs the question as to why not play P/D at that point?

That’s kind of just my view on it, though. It would be a crazy buff to vshare, which I’m not sure needs it as it has such binary representations of effectiveness (either incredibly good or useless).

I had a 16 second cd in mind actually because mesmer’s “Main the Disillusioned” trait as well as their illusionary counter. Comparitively speaking, using utility slots for a 20(16) second cooldown application of 3 stacks of torment/vuln or 5 stacks of poison doesn’t seem unreasonable.

Skelk venom can be dodged and has a cast time, so 25 doesn’t seem unreasonable.

Ice drake could use a 30 second CD.

DV and BV actually have a decent CD for their utility.

Part of my thinking is that you have to invest so many traits into your build that venoms end up being the only thing worth putting on it (I agree with your assessment of losing SS and others). If you could have 1 or 2 that could more frequently, you could afford to have more on your bar. Maybe VShare could be changed to share the number of stacks -1 (with a minimum of one) to allies. So skale would only share 2 (3 with RV) and BV would only ever share 1 stack.

Because it’s one of the methods for counterplaying stealth, even though some non-thieves will claim that it doesn’t work anyway.

DeceiverX.8361:

While condition diversity is definitely important, a DB rotation can stack 15 bleeds versus 9, and with uncatchable and caltrops in the mix paired with immob like panic strike, Devourer, SB stealth #1, and cripple from Dancing Dagger, there’s a ton of disabling conditions which can help lock down those bleeds easily to 25. Upping the target cap could be acceptable, though as far as directional targeting goes, I’m not sure if I agree it’s necessary; the skill does cause you to travel exactly the direction you’re facing just like using HS for mobility purposes. It lets the caster cut down on APM/potential casting delays with minimal impact on performance. I’d personally rather have the system handle that stuff for me due to the many instances of lag I’ve had where the different actions of targeted casting have caused bugs or problematic delays. That’s just me, though, and I think that’s very much personal preference at that point. On-crit sigils and rune effects, be it krait frequently working with BV or perplexity depending on the mode, paired with CnD’s vuln stacks can allow for substantial condition diversity overall. It’s not like what engineers bring, but those are arguably a lot more powerful as a class to the point where nerfs pretty much anywhere to the class are pretty justified.

Of course, from a vanilla perspective and DoT point of view, yes, the set is lacking for condition players, and frankly, this is something that I believe cannot be resolved without substantial changes to how the class plays; ultimately more condition diversity is tied to having condition access to multiple skills, which is usually included with the explicit implementations of condition damage-based sets. From this standpoint, anything necessary to make DB a potent condi build skill would make the skill too powerful in it of itself if the rest of the build requires none of the other skills on the bar to function, which makes the set under a condition build be too effective in terms of APM : damage/usability and/or providing an excess of utility reducing the skill component of the build.

The only thing I could think of would be to allow for the addition of a condi applicator skill from stealth not tied to stab or HS to avoid conflicts with power builds, but with P/D being so strong, I have to question whether or not it’d be a good idea due to how absolutely faceroll easy P/D already is for its ridiculous effectiveness. Giving Dancing Dagger a PBAoE bleed applicator on top of its cripple from stealth to compete with Sneak Attack might be reasonable, but then it just begs the question as to why not just play P/D since there’s already more diversity and better bleed/torment stacking in general, or if too effective, would just be a straight up buff to P/D.

They could always separate the cooldown lengths of the venoms and make skale/spider venom have 20 second CD’s, skelk 25 seconds, and leave the others where they are. That might be an alternative to just attaching more condis to weapon skills.

DeceiverX.8361:

If one wants to play a sniper, just go play rifle war.

I’d really prefer to see an emphasis on the long-range and highly mobile sustained DPS model (longbow) in that it would actually work and create a play style that does not exist currently in the game. Rangers had a failed sustained damage model on the longbow because of a lack of mobility with it and dependencies on the pet/absolutely no burst whatsoever before RF got changed into the meganuke that it is (RF before the buff had lower DPS than the longbow auto-attack including the vuln).

I’m pretty sure the weapon will end up being the rifle seeing that so many people want to be “snipers” being all cool shooting people from invisibility and whatnot… but frankly, that’s just less exciting than a stab build and it can’t be as effective from initiative + ranged making it overall less risky, especially when paired with stealth skills and utilities like SR and BP.

The rifle’s just too weird to be a mobile set, too, imho, and the competition with blinds from pistols would render that set useless as well.

Would like to see something more unique happen to the class, but I have a feeling we’ll just end up with a killshot war rehash because a lot of people seem to want it.

I would like to see mobile, solid sustained damage as well, but with my rifle skins instead of my LB skins. That’s why didn’t have any higher than a 1.5 mult or stealth on the set and had a gap closer and 2 gap creators on my wishlist.

BlackBeard.2873:

^Oh hey Robin (Jeska here)

Anyway, thief inherently has mechanics that are generally broken, such as:
- Instant ports that ignore LOS
- Insane mobility
- Highest evasion uptime possible
- On-demand stealth combined with high burst (and stealth making you largely immune to anything that isnt a channel/melee cleave)
- Instant interrupt that ignores stab

As long as it has even a few of these mechanics, it will ALWAYS be top-tier for a roaming role at the highest skill levels. Right now, thief is the closest it has ever been to balanced in pvp due to high-sustain by other classes making thieves less dominant in 1v1’s (which is balanced given the mobility to force outnumbered fights). It currently has a pretty high skill floor (bad thieves now are REALLY bad), and will always have a high skill-cap.

Also, ignore most of the thieves whining about “being the most-nerfed class,” as the class is still top-tier at the roles it plays. Also, many “nerfs” that happened were accompanied by serious buffs in other ways that kept builds near the top but less broken. Most of these complaints come from bad thieves who relied on being OP to carry them while playing at a low level, while high-level players just shake their head and learn to adapt and thrive.

Disclaimer: Every class has SOME mechanics like this, so I am not trying to say “OMG pls nerf now.” (Even though I abhor SA thieves b/c it is so little risk for its reward outside of conquest).

Hey!

Generally I agree. I like where thief is right now, except that a few skills/traits could use a few tweaks and buffs like Deathblossom, traps, and venoms (which need to have different CD’s based on the effect ). S/D is a little boring for me, so I’m still mainly using D/D even in pvp. The devs seem to like where we are right now too cause we’ve dodged the nerf bat the last couple of rounds (or we hid in SR). I have in the past and probably will continue in the future complain about thief nerfs, but they would probably have to redesign the entire class before I stopped playing it. I like the highly mobile glass cannon style of play. I don’t think every nerf has been accompanied by a buff somewhere else but it certainly has raised the skill floor, which is something I have grown to not mind.

Cya around!

yolo swaggins.2570:

The engineer can already use the rifle and it is speculated they are getting hammer. The Ranger is confirmed getting a Staff with the Druid Specialization. That leaves thief.

Secondly, this post is the most well thought-out and well-recieved weapon suggestion in the thief forums. If anet had any sense they would take it and make it their own because the OP not only went through the trouble of providing tooltips and math, but he also designed a few traits to go along with it. On top of all that it looks fun to use AND it gives thieves a long range option.

I preferred mine

That auto attack on the idea you linked is a little underpowered to say the least (especially the cone thing, guard staff auto has a 0.6 multiplier on it for reference). That bullet to the knee is pretty weak as well(DancingDagger has a 0.5 multiplier on it, so the only benefit from this is the longer cripple). If a lot of our damage doesn’t come from a decent auto, we’re gonna end up with another P/P unload initiative sink. I think we should have the option to have decent damage at long range, but get more powerful as we get closer as opposed to mesmers and rangers. Damage is really low on that overall.

DarkSyze.8627:

That is not true; i play wow and rogue are viable and not at bottom. Do research before point finger at another mmo game company profession. Last, Blizzard made rogue a challenge class; not like this non challenge “rogue thief” here. Even Square Enix Ninja profession is viable and challenge=fun. If Blizzard and Square Enix was in charge of Guild Wars 2, thief would be challenge class- with no 1-2 skill only class and Stealth always class and instant kill always class. In return; more player would return to game and more player would use more time to play Guild Wars 2 more.

Thief will never be at bottom tier because arena net believe thief is viable and challenge class. By time arena net realize thief is not viable and challenge class, it will be to late; player will leave and spend more time with other mmo game that is challenge and fun.

Example; some people people still believe earth is flat. What can you do? 2 things-

1. Believe them and waste all your time and blame everybody for your mistake after you find truth.
2. Leave them or use more time to find truth and when find truth; use rest time to explore beauty of life and it challenge.

Hey, did you watch that counter pressure video I linked in the other thread yet?

Here’s the link again so you don’t have to go searching for it again :

Phantrupt Asskicker CS Interrupt vs Thief: http://youtu.be/Iz3vb8fBIoY

DeceiverX.8361:

You’re correct in why they’re at odds, but again the big problem is that it seems simply impossible to really adjust utility/defensive options of the skill to favor power builds while not overly-buffing condition/hybrid ones. Giving DB more utility with no trade-off in terms of damage output for condition users only makes the skill even more overly-rewarding and pushes condi/hybrid players to playing even more condi-heavy due to its crazy performance for them. Buffing the utility makes spamming 3 just more viable while not diversifying the way the set is played, and ultimately doesn’t leave a lot of room for power-based utilitiy buffs since that utility gain needs to be considered when buffing DB at all. It’s basically kind of like a condi player asking for backstab to give distortion since the evade frame on DB is poor and condition players want to build aggressively and use DB safely for condition bursting. The problem then is that backstab also becomes just way too strong on power builds by giving it unnecessary amounts of utility.

There’s a limited budget on both ends and they’re both conflicting in both demands and that the styles themselves have pretty much opposite strengths/weaknesses making any kind of adjustment extremely difficult.

The thing is though that D/D has a limited types of conditions on the set, so I would argue that that overall it wouldn’t be overwhelming. Look at the other condi-centric classes or P/D. Their strength relies on a diversity of both damaging and utility conditions. Yes, you could burst up to 9 stacks of bleed at the cost of 12 initiative, but a single condi clear would remove the whole stack. Now consider that a lot of cleansing is averaging 1 condition removed every 4-5 seconds, but the sheer number and reapplication is what eventually drags you down. I know i keep picking on engi (and I’m not commenting or complaining about the state of that class whatsoever), but consider getting hit with autos and pistol #2 (poison dart volley). If they have incindiary powder, all those together (~2 bleeds, poison, burning with no condi extenders) that’s roughly equivalent to 9 bleeds worth of damage, but removing any one condition only partially cuts their output, which would probably be the case with a 3 condition removal skill due to the cover conditions also applied. With D/D bleeds, once you’ve stacked those 9 bleeds and covered them with the other conditions on the set (cripple, vuln, poison), a 3 condi removal skill has a 75% chance of removing the vast majority of your damage output, not just a piece of it. Necro, mesmer, and ele are capable of similar condition diversity without using utility skills. That’s why I don’t think the direct damage needs to be toned down for the utility to be increased, because D/D thief will still be a very all-or-nothing set whether using a direct damage or bleed burst.

So what i guess I’m saying is that I see this strong burst with lack of diversification as fine on the D/D set as both playstyles would be limited by the fact that they are both a burst or die proposition at that point. DB thieves would have a little bit of protection in their evade frames, but it would be able to be countered by keeping calm and using condi cleanses and dodges as you would blocks and dodges against its power variant. You would also be able to see that burst coming as well with the thief sliding back and forth through your character. The addition of aiming the trail would keep it somewhat in check as well.

I think we’re just going to have a difference of opinion on this point though.

PopeUrban.2578

The problem, right now, with the skill is not that it’s good in one spec and bad in the other. It’s that it underperforms in a condition spec and is absolutely useless in a power spec, and this is true in both PvE and all forms of PvP.

This sums up why I think just upping the utility won’t be overwhelming, because it’s not as if D/D LDB unicorn is slightly underperfoming, it’s barely there. With a little tweaking to the skill though, both camps could be satisfied.

Ensign.2189:

Maugetarr.6823:

I guess I’m “meh” about the number of targets.

Think of it this way. There are two audiences that you want to make happy with a set of changes. First, you have people using the set for its primary play pattern of high burst, that want to see Death Blossom be a defensive tool to compliment that pattern and don’t really care about its damage. Second, you have people who like the secondary pattern of balling up enemies in Caltrops and using it to stack a bunch of bleeds, who really care about how much bleeding it can put out and care much less about any defense on the skill.

To keep the skill at an appropriate power level, the more damage the skill does, the less room for utility there is in its power budget, which fundamentally puts these two patterns at odds over what to do with the skill.

The advantage of a higher target cap and larger AoE is that it adds substantial power to the secondary pattern but essentially no power to the primary pattern. If you raised the AoE and target cap, but lowered the bleeding duration, it would still be a substantial buff to the skill for the players who like stacking bleeds on targets in Caltrops, who will hit the bleed cap anyway – but a big nerf to it in dueling situations; it would also be a much larger nerf to builds without +condition duration, as the bleeds would be more likely to expire before the target does, while on a dedicated condition thief with stacked bleed duration the nerf would be more muted, allowing for even bigger cuts in condition duration without substantially harming the secondary pattern.

That damage nerf in a dueling situation leaves more PvP power budget for additional utility – more evasion, projectile reflection, etc – which is what the primary pattern needs if the set is going to be a niche set in competitive play.

Essentially, the per-target damage is what is holding the skill back from getting the changes it needs. If that can be lowered, while adding tools to both sides that don’t impact the other as much (more targets in a higher area for PvE bleed stackers, evasion for PvP), then I think both patterns can be happy with a set of changes that enhance their specific role without making the skill crazy overpowered.

Just to be clear, I’m not against increasing the number of targets, i just don’t care either way as long as the utility of the skill is improved to make it useful for both types of builds.

As for lowering the damage if they increased the number of targets, i dont think that its really necessary for something that costs 4 initiative. If you look at bomb engi again, it has a 1.25 multiplier on it for those 5 targets. That’s pretty decent for how quickly it happens. Cross class comparisons aren’t always good to make, so I’ll come back to the thief. On lotus strike, you get a 0.85 multiplier and 4 seconds of poison (roughly 2 bleeds) On 2 targets. That’s pretty decent In terms of utility and damage. DB get a 0.6 multiplier and 3 bleeds for 10 seconds and a negligible evade. If you’re condition, that 0.6 is nothing, and if you’re power, those 3 bleeds are nothing (about equal to a sigil of air proc across 10 seconds). So if we look at changing it to a 0.5 second evade and 0.6 damage to 5 targets, that’s an outgoing of 3.0 damage total (assuming everything hits max targets) for 4 initiative. If we compare that to pistolwhip, the slashing portion has ~3.0 multiplier and hits up to 3 targets for 5 Initiative. That’s a total of 9.0 multiplier damage going out, or 1.8 multiplier damage per initiative which is more likely to all land because that is divided amongst 3 targets. DB would only be 0.75 multipler damage per initiative (+bleeds). I know I’m failing to take DPS into account, but it think initiative pool limitations are a bigger factor here.

In short, it don’t think they need to reduce damage after improving utility, but if that became the case, they could always lower damage as long as they left a viable skill in terms of utility.

I picked PW for comparison because the damage and evade take place in close combat simultaneously and doesn’t have a rollover skill, similar to deathblossom as opposed to other skills

PopeUrban.2578:

Maugetarr.6823:

PopeUrban.2578:

I don’t think replacing it functionally is a good thing. It has an implied function as an aoe condition application skill with short term defensive benefit, and that shouldn’t change.

People crowing that it has an inconsistant damage type are missing the point, Daggers are and always were a combined condition/dps set, and the skills set up on thief bars for them were done as they were specifically because initiative allows us to skip a skill if it doesn’t work with our template, and use it for rare utility cases.

DB already does that. It’s a good bleed applier for condi builds, but it’s a kittenty defensive tool for crit builds. Thus, it needs its utility upped, not a damage change.

Adding ranged reflect to it is a great idea, another might be moving the evade frame to the END of the skill (since they don’t want thieves to have spammable initiative based evades considering they nerfed them all) which would solve the current problem it has as a defensive tool (people just wait until you’re on the way down from the spin and whack you)

If it added evade to the end of the animation and a short .1 sec evade buff after it completed, it would be functional as a repositioning tool, and if timed well could actually be used to gap open or close as you could chain a dodge after.

Increasing target count to 5 doesn’t seem unreasonable, as they like to buff lifeleech style builds (and I play such a build) as it would make it a solid aoe option and help out the survivability of lifeleech/evade bunker style builds as well as a little teamfight utility.

Adding a ranged reflect might make it too powerful, but as you stated the utility just needs to be upped. If they left the damage and bleeds the same, but changed the skill to have a 0.5 second evade with a 0.75 second total time, and a directional component like whirlwind attack (warrior’s GS #3), it would be no more powerful than flanking strike or disabling shot, but would be useful in whatever build you play. That would be about the same amount of spam at 4 initiative as the others. So I second most of your argument.

True, the reflect might be a bit much, but it sounds like a fun idea. I suppose one or the other needs to be the case, either a functional evade people can actually use in pvp somehow, or a reflect, both would make it have decent utility.

The 5 target limit just seems like a given. If you’re sacrificing enough to stack heals from Signet of malice and sunk deep enough in CA for invigorating precision, you’ve already traded off enough DPS traits and utility for the direct healing skills that the situational benefit of the extra heals from two more targets hit per cast seem a worthwhile tradeoff.

As a guy who likes to run such a build in zerg fights and PvE, i can say that the sustainability of these builds is decent, but it’s not nearly where it should be given what I have to sacrifice to take a CA master trait on a largely condition based build.

I guess I’m “meh” about the number of targets. Take engi bomb kit for example. The autoattack on bombs has 5 targets, but outside of pve, the likelihood of hitting all 5 isn’t that great, even with big ol’ bomb. So if DB had a sliding range of 300, the likelihood of connecting with up to 5 people (again,outside of pve) isn’t that great. I personally don’t think this would be overpowered (even with a 5 target cap) because D/D is trading the soft CC that D/P gets and the boonsteal and gap closers/creators that S/D gets for damage. Bringing up the dual skill would round out the set without outshining the other sets.

Edit: I guess in WvW you could hit up to 5 people with a slide, but individual damage to each would certainly not be gamebreaking.

PopeUrban.2578:

I don’t think replacing it functionally is a good thing. It has an implied function as an aoe condition application skill with short term defensive benefit, and that shouldn’t change.

People crowing that it has an inconsistant damage type are missing the point, Daggers are and always were a combined condition/dps set, and the skills set up on thief bars for them were done as they were specifically because initiative allows us to skip a skill if it doesn’t work with our template, and use it for rare utility cases.

DB already does that. It’s a good bleed applier for condi builds, but it’s a kittenty defensive tool for crit builds. Thus, it needs its utility upped, not a damage change.

Adding ranged reflect to it is a great idea, another might be moving the evade frame to the END of the skill (since they don’t want thieves to have spammable initiative based evades considering they nerfed them all) which would solve the current problem it has as a defensive tool (people just wait until you’re on the way down from the spin and whack you)

If it added evade to the end of the animation and a short .1 sec evade buff after it completed, it would be functional as a repositioning tool, and if timed well could actually be used to gap open or close as you could chain a dodge after.

Increasing target count to 5 doesn’t seem unreasonable, as they like to buff lifeleech style builds (and I play such a build) as it would make it a solid aoe option and help out the survivability of lifeleech/evade bunker style builds as well as a little teamfight utility.

Adding a ranged reflect might make it too powerful, but as you stated the utility just needs to be upped. If they left the damage and bleeds the same, but changed the skill to have a 0.5 second evade with a 0.75 second total time, and a directional component like whirlwind attack (warrior’s GS #3), it would be no more powerful than flanking strike or disabling shot, but would be useful in whatever build you play. That would be about the same amount of spam at 4 initiative as the others. So I second most of your argument.

Thaddeus.4891:

Zelyhn Lekovitch.2867:

If I remember correctly it was Kitsune who first introduced the idea of stacking damage modifiers and using LH.

Also, Neko has had a strong role in bringing the elementalist out of obscurantism

Its been a long time and you are right about Kitsune. Why I remember a fox. I think kitsune avatar on guru was a fox, but I can be wrong. Its been almost two years, unbelievable how time go fast.

“Kitsune” is the Japanese word for fox. Could be why you had “fox” stuck in your head.

@OP: i prefer my ele to my thief for dungeons due to its group might/fury stacking. It’s absolutely excellent for both guild groups and pugs. You can sit back and semi – carry newer players too with some of the group healing abilities on staff (for non optimized or non speed run groups). You just need a bunch of blast finishers to pump out the watee field heals if someone is about to go down, then switch back into fire.

Terissimo.6852:

No, we are not. Those thieves are just weak.

Well we’re generally weak to condi burst and continual application. We can have decent removal if we trait for it, but we don’t exactly have the continual high amount of removal that the other classes do. An example is ele. Ele has excellent burst condi removal and ongoing removal, where we lack the burst removal. That’s fine though because it’s supposed to be our weakness (as stated a long while ago in one of the “high level balance decisions” thread).

Overall I agree we aren’t weak.

I was expecting you to burst the thief after the updraft at the end, but you switched to water instead of fire and wasted the cc. When i play D/X ele, typically I go air(DPS/cc)>fire (burst/fire field)>earth (soft cc/hard cc/defensive CD/blast finisher)>water (recovery/blast finisher). I’ve seen a couple of other successful rotations, but the premise is the same CC>burst>react with defensive attunements while stacking might. Your rotation was more CC>wait>recover>burst. Against an acrobatics thief, the animations make the burst easily avoidable if you haven’t properly disabled your target.

Honestly “teef” and “teefs” bothers me less than “thiefs.”

“Teef(s)” is just people making a joke where “thiefs” is usually the wrong plural (as opposed to referring to the possessive “thief’s,” with a forgotten apostrophe).

Don’t know if it was intentional or not(Helly switched it out for you) but you have long reach instead of BT, meaning you have no access to vigor, feline grace, or stealth on your skill bar. This is a very burst or die build (which is fine).

Looking forward to the videos.

Kadin.2356:

Maugetarr.6823:

Ensign.2189:

Kadin.2356:

We just want it looked at next time they do a pass at the weapon skills, as it is an outlier for the set and not really serving its intended purpose imho.

More specifically, if you look at every other thief melee set (that is, D/P, S/P, S/D) they have a big chunk of their power in their dual attack. D/D, on the other hand, has a particularly weak dual attack. While D/D still has a high damage cheese pattern from C&D + Backstab, the lack of a functional dual attack does hurt the set, and is a big part of why it sees no competitive play.

Well, the change to dancing dagger has been nice. Maybe they’re taking a look at the skills in the set? Keep in mind that they just fixed warrior’s rush (supposedly, GS#5) after 2 years and they didn’t change functionality too much in terms of damage, so maybe it’s just taking longer to figure out what direction to go in for DB. More evade frames-> still clunky when compared to other dual skills. It doesn’t need more damage since there’s already the most burst on that set, it just needs better utility which the set lacks.

Yea even if they add evade frames it wouldn’t fix the main problem which is that it locks you into a (relatively) long animation that makes you predictable. In any pvp setting a predictable thief is a dead thief. I’d much rather they drop the evade frames and turn it into a thief version of warrior sword #3? Whirlwind? The one that spins you around like crazy? That would fill the AE damage gap that I think DB is intended to fill while also adding enough movement so that you aren’t a sitting duck at the end of the animation.

I think we’re on the same page here. Here’s to hoping that they (still)browse our forums without posting(anymore).

:)

Ensign.2189:

Kadin.2356:

We just want it looked at next time they do a pass at the weapon skills, as it is an outlier for the set and not really serving its intended purpose imho.

More specifically, if you look at every other thief melee set (that is, D/P, S/P, S/D) they have a big chunk of their power in their dual attack. D/D, on the other hand, has a particularly weak dual attack. While D/D still has a high damage cheese pattern from C&D + Backstab, the lack of a functional dual attack does hurt the set, and is a big part of why it sees no competitive play.

Well, the change to dancing dagger has been nice. Maybe they’re taking a look at the skills in the set? Keep in mind that they just fixed warrior’s rush (supposedly, GS#5) after 2 years and they didn’t change functionality too much in terms of damage, so maybe it’s just taking longer to figure out what direction to go in for DB. More evade frames→ still clunky when compared to other dual skills. It doesn’t need more damage since there’s already the most burst on that set, it just needs better utility which the set lacks.

Do you have pvp steady weapons equipped by accident? (not sure if those are still available from vendor )

@ gaile: One of the better ideas I’ve seen suggested for improving/unlocking traits and trait points is not waiting till level 30 to start the unlocking. If you gave people their first trait points at level 15 and every 5 levels subsequently (15, 20, 25….etc up till 80) that would go a whole lot farther to freling like progression. IIRC, the old system let you unlock the tomes at 11 and you gained 1 trait point per level after, giving you 70 at 80. Since they simplified it to 14 total, it seems the logical step would have been make it 1 every 5. I don’t think that would be overwhelming for new players to pick up 1 trait every 5 levels.

Another thing would be to give new players at least the first (adept) tier of skill automatically like the lowest manual used to. Have them talk to a skill trainer or have an instanced trainer mission that has them equip a couple of different traits to show how to use them. I.e: a thief trainer would have them go into an instance, equip uncatchable, then dodge roll by a dummy to leave the caltrops. Then it would have them equip mug and steal to a dummy to see the damage. Then new player would make the connection that they can augment their standard abilities and be excited about every 5 levels when they get a new trait point.

This would be less than 1 minute for an experienced player, but really helpful to new players.

Edit: this training would have to be done with 2 trait points, so maybe do it at level 20 and give them 2 then and 1 every five levels after (@20:2, @25:1, @30:1….etc). That would also line up nicely with 20 level experience scrolls.

New, master level traits could be gained, not by doing map completion or something like that, but using certain skills. E.G (thief again): You get bountiful theft by stealing 100 times or something similar, so it really feels like you’re training a certain aspect of these characters. These could then unlock in PvP too (all abilities should be available like they currently are in PvP, still, but they would unlock in PvE/WvW as well).

DarkSyze.8627:

Coronit.9432:

Zero Day.2594:

Necrotize.2974:

Jana.6831:

Necrotize.2974:

Why not just nerf and buff wildly in both directions and hope it works out.

Isn’t that what’s already happening?

Maybe it just needs to happen more until we hit that sweet spot? Just go into the damage modifiers for all the skills and randomly add in "0"’s and “.”’s making some skills hit like wet noodles and others hit like wet noodles filled with cement.

Well, if skills 1 and 2 hit like a wet noodle while skills 3 and 4 hit like a wet noodle with cement and lastly skill five hits like half a wet cement noodle…. We will have balance!

:D I feel like I should be on the balancing team! My noodle skills seem sharp.

Please no noodle skill…
Noodle-skill
Be aware of the muscles our thieves will get and the QQ following because of that.

you make good joke and i find video funny; i laugh. But after laugh; problem is still here. Again, there is nothing wrong to be funny; it is wrong to pretend thief class have no problem. Arena net need to take thief class problem serious to make game fun and challenge; expansion is not answer, serious action is answer.

Laugh and joke will not fix anything but make problem worse. Seriousness is solution for problem; not joke; 1 more year-2015 of joke is not ok and will make game worse and will make more player find other game company who take game and problem serious. No More; 1 more Year of thief problem!!!

Did you watch the counter-bursting video? The solution already exists.

I would also recommend 3 in acrobatics for hard bosses (or in general ). S/P is great for trash mobs because of the high evasion uptime and cleave . D/D is typically used for single targets like bosses. SB (or P/P depending on your preference ) is usually kept as your swap so if you get hit down to about half health, you can back off and keep hitting them in the meantime.

Most of your survivability comes from complete avoidance of the damage, so if you’re used to tanking with blocks or armor stats that’s not going to work well on thief. You need to learn the hard hitting animations and not get hit by them.

I would recommend a tankier build to soak up a few mistakes and running with your guild until you learn the ropes. Running with mostly people you know is a lot less likely to get you kicked for not running optimal builds and stats while you learn.