Guild Wars 2

They have excellent mobility, having either a low CD teleport to people, or a 3sec CD sprint that removes movement impairing effects.

Stealth is very limitted in WoW tho. It’s hardly comparable. Stealth abilities are much more powerful and more about CC than damage. No restealth in combat but they get a restealth ability every 3min with a 5min CD that refresh it

Definitely making the pistol, it looks really cool. I’m hoping P/P stays viable for Engi because of that pistol skin lol

It’s not a novelty but I think something similar to the Cheat Death mechanic Rogues have in WoW would be great for Thieves.

For people that don’t know about it, it’s a passive that makes it when a Rogue would take fatal damage, they instead survive with very low health and get heavy damage reduction for a few seconds. Has a pretty heavy ICD of course.

I’m not saying this is necessary, I’m just very scared of playing Thief without the security of vamp runes. It makes the class even harder to play and even less able to engage in teamfights.

laquito.5269:

Nocta.5274:

Can we buff Thief natural defenses now that Vamp runes are nerfed ? Pretty please ?

It’s not fun to get one shotted from stuff you sometimes can’t even see coming. Vamp runes kept abusive burst to feel unfair.

Woah, you’re some special kind of hypocrite.
First claiming thief to be fine until very recently and now that Vamp rightfully gets shafted you’re starting to cry over thief balance? The hypocritism in this forum never fails to amaze me.

OT:
Only took you guys a year to realize how broken vamp runes are, congratulations. I also applaud the decision to put some gimmick WvW Rune into sPvP, thats some pro balance right there.

Well, yeah, Thief is fine, but this change affect it a lot, so a slight buff to compensate wouldn’t be too much.
You’re saying this like I’m making a full 180 on what I usually sayu.. which is not the case at all. :/

I just feel like Vamp runes is a big part of why Thief can currently engage in some fights they couldn’t without them.

That’s definitely a Human Female in the twitch vod

The issue right now for Thieves in raid content, revenants do everything better than us by a large margin.
Revenants actually makes every power dps spec that doesn’t provide unique buffs( aka warriors banners ) almost irrelevant.

Silverkey.2078:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Foefaller.1082:

Doesn’t revealed have a shorter duration in WvW than it does in spvp?

Very little wuv roaming/dueling experience here, but maybe with a large window to fight back, trapper runes won’t be as bad as they are expected to be.

Thief traps don’t do direct damage, and as such don’t inflict Revealed.

I think that’s the one thing they need to fix if they don’t want this rune to kill PvP.

I wouldn’t be worried about trap thief anytime soon, even with trapper runes.

I like how you can instantly say it’s better, as a pure fact, when you didn’t even get to try it yet, nor see it in a pvp environment.

How can you take yourself seriously saying things like that.

I don’t understand the issue with celestial builds having sustain.. That’s kinda the point. Damage was definitely the issue with the build before the patch, now they’re fine. They don’t get as much might, they don’t inflict as much burn, you have to land some tricky skills to get good burst ( Burning speed, Fire grab, Updraft )

If it wasn’t for the support they provide, DD ele would be outclassed pretty hard by cele engi, who have way more might access and as much sustain.

Don’t fight 1v1. Try to help your team when they are in even fights. Hunt down the squishy targets in the back of those fights. When it looks like your team is winning the skirmishes, leave for decap / helping your other point.

Use your stealth to help secure stomps / rezzes. Use Steal on kill targets.

Looks really cool actually.

Can we buff Thief natural defenses now that Vamp runes are nerfed ? Pretty please ?

It’s not fun to get one shotted from stuff you sometimes can’t even see coming. Vamp runes kept abusive burst to feel unfair.

I have a really hard time getting my head around how to play Mesmer. The lack of good auto attack is kinda weird to me.

Run shadow Arts instead of critical strike. The condi clear happens right when you enter stealth, so it’s very good against class that only apply one damaging condi ( like burn guard )

shadowstep return, and getting an instant cleanse with binding powder is supposed to be enough for quick condi clear.
Laming in stealth for other scenari works well, just be patient.

Blood is a good alternative to Fire on D/P these days imo. Good for survability / damage.

Engi is probably a bit harder because it doesn’t really use rotations like Ele does. It’s more about taking advantage of opportunities by knowing which of your skills you should use at that time.

Although the HGH elixirs builds these days are a lot easier than what Engi was in the past.

You basically copy the current sPvP D/P SA build and use the stats combination you found on other threads.

Chips.7968:

It used to be 50% reduced damage in stealth… but they rolled it up into other trait and reduced it.

It also wasn’t a minor trait we get for free. Nobody was able to take Resilience of Shadow before the 23rd June patch.
Can’t remember if it was a Master or GrandMaster, but it had huge competition.

Just noticed that despite a recent patch “fixing” Ankle shots providing unintended increased range on Pistols abilities, there is still some abilities left unchanged.

Ankle shots ( Master trait in Critical Strike ) still affect :

Sneak Attack ( Pistol 1 in Stealth ) : gains 150 range from it.

Shadow Shot ( Dagger Pistol 3 ) : gains 300 range from it.

I’ve never been one to really care much about build variety as long as each class has atleast one very viable build to play. I’m a Thief player after all, so I know the situation.

I think the elite spec will bring some needed build variety, but if it was to stay like it is right now, I’m fine with it. Almost every class has 2 good builds to use, and a few decent ones for fun that still perform okay.

Phantom.5389:

@Nocta.5274

Why can’t people read my original post >_>

Second time I have to clarify what I already posted. I don’t mean that burn is a problem for TOP TEAM PVP… Mainly because they have conditions cleanse covered with their composition.

I’m talking about solo queue, where you get to play with what you have at hand.

Also, I don’t talk about hotjoin since I don’t play in there (heard it’s a cesspool of pvp dailies farmer filled with leavers and 3v5 and 4v5).

I do give you the point about soldier engineer build, I did see it played even in solo queue, mainly due to the fact that they have high sustain and decent cleansing power while still being a decent damage dealer. But, seen more often than condition engineer? I would not go that far for solo queue, only in a team pvp scenario does I see them more often.

The pattern I notice is that any power build, to be considered viable need to be one of those build with incredible conditions immunity or condition cleanse (or be supported by a support guard/warr or necro condi transfer).

As for longbow ranger, well I did say it was not a dead end. But in any case a shatter mesmer will benefit more in a role of a 1v1 or +1 scenario than a GS/LB ranger. A good thief can still be viable in solo queue, but they usually melt nowadays when I finally get to see one of those mythical creature (exaggeration right there if you don’t catch that sarcasm). Apart from the times I queue with a friend who main thief, thieves feels underreprensented in the actual pvp scene for solo queue.

Hum, okay. I see.
Honestly, I’m not exactly sure what you want to be done about the fact that people need to use good builds overall in solo queue.

People run these builds because they work well no matter what the composition you end up getting in your solo games. Which is also why solo queue Thieves get rarer the higher you get in MMR, it’s a good class but you can’t use it every game and most people don’t want to have to rely on a secondary.

Also, burn builds are a good gimmick to grind against bad players in my opinion. I could see Engineer choosing to play Burn rabid at the start for those reasons. Although in that kind of scenario, condi necro isn’t a thing, minionmancer will be the build to use.

Phantom.5389:

@Nocta.5274

Please read the post before answering to it. I did clarify that if I play a premade it is fine since I will run with a team composition based against conditions (see here elementalist/support guard/support warrior/necros and add in a few power damage dealer). Team pvp and solo Q is 2 different beast. Insolo Q if you wanna win, your build diversity is affected greatly since condition needs to be hard countered if you want to ensure not raging at aoe condition fest (and as I said, sometimes even if you roll support, you alone is often not enough to keep the condition spreading around in check, and that is while playing one of the most boring bunker support build… sorry for those who loves those build but you are the true MVP).

@Dashi.1368
It is not a question of winning/losing. It is the fact that most class are forced into a specific build (be it burning build or mass cleanse build in a solo Q pvp).

Thieves -> Non-existent or closely
Rangers -> Condi ranger
Mesmer -> There are some, glad they can still play shatter mesmer, be it condi or power.
Warrior -> Support warrior
Guardian -> Support Guardian or burn guard
Engineer -> Burn engineer
Necromancer -> Currently in a sweet spot due to condition meta.
Elementalist -> Meta did not change how they are played, but still mainly one build can be seen and it’s DD/cele ele.

I’d rather have a win/loss ratio much worst. Let’s be honest if you duo Q and you and your friend play support/support or support/burn you just got yourself a solid starting team and will most likely win this pugs vs pugs battle. As for solo Q, odds are still in your favor if you get to play a support build. Yet, where is build diversity? Nowhere to be seen…As a Warrior main I hate this meta. It got old really fast…

You’re wrong on so many things it’s crazy lol

Thief is fine, it’s used by every top team bare one or two. It’s one of the best utility class you can bring to conquest mode. It suffers build variety issues but that’s always been a problem for thieves.

The most played ranger build is Power Ranger with greatsword / Longbow. Condi ranger is a gimmick 1v1 build that lose to actual good 1v1er.

Engineer is played as soldier riffle, and the second best build for it is probably celestial engi. Burn engi comes pretty far as it’s way less powerful than Burn guard at applying burn often. Burn engi is also forced into Rabid amulet, so they’re squishy as hell.

Necromancer are doing well because they have condition transfert, which by itself makes them a counter to condition build. There’s only a single good condi build being run at high level ( burn guard ). Boon corruption and uncontested 1v1 power is also very important in why they’re good.

These days, the only class with really poor condition cleanse is mesmer without inspiration because they choose to play that way. Everyone else has enough cleanse for burning to not be this big issue you try to make it to be.

You know that the strongest engi build, the meta one run by pro team, is a pure power build with no burning, right ?

His main condition removal and healing comes from his water atunement.
When you see him switch to water is when he’s gonna heal a lot, so you want to either have cc ( if they don’t have armor of earth available ) and or Poison / high condition coverage ( having a lot of different conditions to prevent him from removing the important one )

Also, saying you’re a toolkit engi doesn’t mean much. Toolkit doesn’t define a build by itself.

Tabootrinket.2631:

The Nevermore is screaming to be used as a melee weapon :p

Bash people until they have feathers in their mouth.

meepeY.2867:

Enforcer & the Guild Commendation Staff both look really cool for Daredevil.

Lets face it, the Scythe skin though… Anyone got 3500~gold spare for me?

I have an old screenshot of when the Scythe used to cost 150 gold and I didn’t have them back then.. I look at it so sour. :p

I’m not even sure I will use staff much, but definitely the one from the Daredevil track.

You can design a comp around 2 thieves, it just needs 2 very strong bunkers on it too.
2 thieves team are just a a slightly worse version of mesmer + thief.

But in solo queue, 2 thieves works really bad because people don’t play to its strength, and you’ll see the non thieves rotate too much. Also, if the enemy team has a burn guard or a Lock On engineer, double thief is suddenly a lot worse.

By the way, 3 years Thief main here, and I’m in the camp that while Thief has a lot of issues, its a perfectly viable top conquest class. D/P SA is top tier.

mysterion.1276:

Im playing thief for years now and its the only class I like…. I have the achievements anyway I just dont want to swap main because the matchmaking is bad. I wont ever play unranked because of trollhamer/courtyard. What is my option?Quit thief?idk…

When you want to solo queue at high level with Thief, you NEED to have a secondary class to switch to if there’s too many thieves on your team.That’s just how it is.

Actually, Stealth is a pretty big part of why pro teams use a thief. Merciful Ambush and Shadow Refuge rezzes are that strong.

This is very nice. Basically now, as a S/D Thief with Dash, I take 20% less damage from a weakened foes in comparison to what we played during BWE3. ( 10% on dash itself, and those )

That’s very big as far as 1v1 power goes.

assassin.7895:

The kitten are you saying?

First off: Revenant will be a very popular class and it has AoE insta cast reveal afaik. Counterplay? Close to every revenant will have it.

Second: Gyro will of course be used. WTF are you saying, srsly?! Run WvW, see thief using stealth weapon set, put gyro in and kitten him. I mean there are many rangers who run Sic Em and engis who run Spot on already.

The aoe reveal from revenant has a telegraph animation ( dragon eyes appear before it flash the reveal )

Lock On is the only relevant reveal being run right now. It’s one that you can kinda deal with for now.

The glint reveal has a telegraph, so its a fine one.
The scrapper one is bullkitten tho, no telegraph, its on toolbet and its more range than any of the other ones. Thanks god the Gyro IA is so bad people won’t use it.

Ascended gear itself is very little overall stats. Focus on ascended trinkets and an ascended dagger before any armor pieces.

Resistance is pretty new and not common at all.

I think we should try to look more at where we could have Protection added. Thief not having protection was probably a design chocie made a long time ago that shouldn’t apply anymore. It’s one of those thing like " warriors should be weak to condition " that was good in theory but didn’t work on practice.

If thief has to be made less reliant on stealth or evades, we need atleast a bit of Protection and Resistance access.

Resistance on reveal is honestly not a bad nor over the top idea, especially if tied to a trait like Revealed Training, which concur with Panic Strike, so it’s not a free trait to take.

It’s not avoidance, its roamers. Otherwise Mesmer doesn’t fit anywhere.

Pistol MH is not very good for Thief these days, but there’s a thread detailing a good Daredevil build coming up for P/P, maybe look into that.

The issue with zerging wvw on a thief, you have 900 range, and steal still put you into the fray.

But heh, if you’re just looking to have some fun, try this kind of build, it should work fine.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQRAqa4al0MhunYhTw0Jw/EHwElPNOj2Y3BfwgqTgAY3A

ArthurDent.9538:

To be honest they should have never been as easy to come by as they are currently. Transmutation crystals were quite valuable, gem store purchases, and anet was extremely generous giving up that source of income by giving them out like candy in pvp.

They did it because before the glory change, changing your skin in PvP was literally free.

As it stands, unless balance is adressed, there’s no reason to run classes that don’t fit into this setup :

1 tank ( which can be multiple things )
Power revenant
Warrior
Chronomancer
Ele or another revenant
4 Sinister Engi
Druid

Anything else is pure handicap to the overall utility and damage of the group, which is something that definitely needs to be addressed.

Don’t play hotjjoin. Play unranked.

Free 10% damage and condi reduction, won’t hate on that !

Taquain.6598:

UBcktieDL.5318:

quick list:

Warrior: very vulnerable to blinds, no teleport skills (can easily get outkited by porting to high ground), reliant on stances to not get bursted.
Guardian: Cooldowns, vulnerable to attrition builds (they can easily mitigate burst with shelter/renewed focus/virtue of courage, but these have high cooldowns). Burn guard is vulnerable to condi transfer (necro, some mesmers)
Thief: getting bursted outside of stealth. thief is hard to catch in stealth but has no blocks/invulnerable skills. You can screw up a thief heavily if you interrupt his black powder->heartseeker stealth combo or by using knockbacks against his shadow refuge. Also thief has low health, a quick burst can down him. Remember a stealthed thief cannot capture points.
Ranger: Projectile reflects against power builds, also low cd condi cleanse against his pet taunt. His defensive tools have some large cooldowns, avoid getting stunned by greatsword in melee. Condi Ranger: Condition transfer and moblity, condi ranger is much slower than power. Also no teleport skills.
Engineer: Spamming different conditions at him, beware of his random transmute every 15s . A lot of Stablity on your side or stun breaks are effective too, most engies have lots of knockbacks. Remember the gear shield cd (16s), nearly every engi uses it.
Mesmer: Has either weak condition removal (PU build) or low amount of stealth (Inspiration build). Also has low dps, but large burst, so either run tanky attrition builds or a glassy build which can evade/absorb shatter combo. Remember that a stealthed mesmer can not capture points.
Necro: Low moblity, no ways to absorb damage outside of evade. Do not attack him while spectral armor is up, you are just recharging his shroud then. Be careful with condition builds since he can transfer them back at you (however blind can prevent it).
Spamming crowd control is extremely effective.
Ele: Ele has no weaknesses and rule pvp right now))
jk they have some but they are hard to use. D/D has no way to prevent taking damage outside of a dodge roll, a coordinated burst from 2-3 mesmer can instantly down an ele. They also have a low amount of stunbreaks on them. Chill affects their attunement recharge rate, a well timed chill after they left water attunement can screw up an elementalist.

Warriors need stances so we dont get bursted…….. tell that to a shout or banner warrior or one with a shield must I also bring up that trait that gives us 1000 toughness and healing and that adrenaline heal with shout trait pretty much gives them full hp and even when they go bunker they still hit like a train people keep forgetting or dont realize warriors are super tanky

Shout support warriors doesn’t have the same weaknesses as a power rampage warrior, that’s pretty normal.

Beating tanky warriors is mostly about trying to keep poison them, and bursting them down. Those warrior do next to no damage, so you shouldn’t be too worried about that when fighting them. The best thing to do is often to avoid fighting them 1 on 1.

style.6173:

Nocta.5274:

Necromonger.4970:

Nocta.5274:

You’re not really familiar with what Betas are for I guess.

I guess you’re not familiar with what betas are, 48 hours here and there isn’t a beta testing, it’s just marketing gimmick to make you pre-purchase the expansion. The cycle of alpha, closed beta, open beta takes months, not a few days.
Not to mention that ANET is “beta testing” on the main servers, forcing(indirectly) everyone, who pvp, to participate. well, no thank you…

Yeah, its called a stress test, because you can’t test stuff forever in a confined Dev environment. You need a lot of players to get statistic and varied feedback.

I tested the Alpha for this game, I think I’m familiar enough with Arenanet way of testing stuff to tell you they’re not clueless by any mean.

As others have told you already, this is the FINAL beta. In a final beta, it is really a preview of how the game will go live. The reality is that ANET has maybe 2 weeks or so where they can still make some adjustments before locking in their release branch. That is not a lot of time to work on balance AND a lot of work still needs to be done.

Scrapper and Druid will get some changes.
Ireno already talked about making druid more reliant on healing power to get real healing instead of being able to go zerk and still heal a lot.

The Berzerk Riffle Burst will get fixed, as its probably unintended.

Outside of that, the elite specs are looking launch ready to me. Not sure what the problems are, but willing to listen to real arguments about it.

Serious Thought.5394:

Anet said they wanted Thief to be the prime duelist. Yep. I said it. I pulled history. Now go look up the original videos. >.< I’m lazy.

I wouldn’t be surprised if they really said this, and theif was a prime duelist for a long time.
You have to remember current balance is also dictated by how Conquest mode is played. I don’t think they knew what Thief’s role would end up being when they designed it with the idea of making it this good duelist.

I wouldn’t mind a little help for us in this domain ( because it’s really hard to duel people of equal skill these days ) but too much help could be really destructive to the main game mode.

Necromonger.4970:

Nocta.5274:

You’re not really familiar with what Betas are for I guess.

I guess you’re not familiar with what betas are, 48 hours here and there isn’t a beta testing, it’s just marketing gimmick to make you pre-purchase the expansion. The cycle of alpha, closed beta, open beta takes months, not a few days.
Not to mention that ANET is “beta testing” on the main servers, forcing(indirectly) everyone, who pvp, to participate. well, no thank you…

Yeah, its called a stress test, because you can’t test stuff forever in a confined Dev environment. You need a lot of players to get statistic and varied feedback.

I tested the Alpha for this game, I think I’m familiar enough with Arenanet way of testing stuff to tell you they’re not clueless by any mean.

I haven’t played the raid, but from watching a few attempts, it seems power Shiro revenant is kinda using our spot, but with way more utility than us thanks to glint. =/

I think we’ll have to wait until release to have a better feel of it.

wasted.6817:

Nocta.5274:

Cynz.9437:

Nocta.5274:

nearlight.3064:

Don’t think about thief as killing everyone in sight. Thats the job of bruiser based classes that are tanky and can stack to 25 might in under 20 seconds.

Your job is primarily to use your unparalleled shortbow mobility to force decaps on side nodes first, and to use SR/SA traits to rez downed allies, since stealth prevents stomps, so unless they have very heavy cleave and see it coming they won’t be able to stop you.

As for actual fighting, have your team call targets for you so you can enter a fight after getting a decap and take down a target thats low and blew all of its cooldowns, while doing the same job of +1ing a 1v1 on a side node. Don’t 1v1 yourself unless its another thief, but you should be able to take on other zerker classes depending on their build, such as zerk staff ele, power engi/war, etc. Especially don’t 1v1 builds with high sustain or tons of active defense.

^ This.

Playing Thief in conquest require you a very different mentality.
You’re here to make your team win, never forget about that.

You mean getting carried by the team? Because thief with bad/average team has 0 influence on outcome of the match.

Whole decapping works only if your team can actually win/hold outnumbered fights.

Whole +1 only works if your teammates is really good at 1v1 and almost killed enemy anyway.

Want to know a scoop ?
By decapping and +1 correctly, YOU are the one carrying the team, not the other way around

You really think your team mate who is holding close is thinking he’s carrying you when you come get rid of that D/D ele harassing him ? Then come back mid faster than any other class and get a game changing stealth rez ? Then use your unparalleled chasing power to finish any runners to help secure your lead ?

This is what Thief excels at. You did your job as a thief, to be useful to the team in ways Thief is incontestably the best at. And maybe it’s harder in pug because you can’t help clueless teams, but we don’t balance kitten for those people.

If this isn’t the role you like in conquest mode, don’t play Thief. If you want to kill people, play signet Necro or D/D Ele.

Yea, you only think you’re carrying. Because if all those “game changing and turning” things you do achieve anything, then it simply means that your team is competent enough and they probably “carry” as much as you do. Otherwise you can break your kitten with your +1es, stealth rezzes, kills and what not and loose miserably because conquest in not the mode where one person can carry anything at all. You either get a good team and complement it in a good way thinking you’re such a carrier or you get a bad one and literally nothing you do will help. Max you can achieve is prolong your struggle.

I may be looking at the glass like it’s half full, but you’re looking at it thinking its completely empty.
I have 72% winrate in solo queue ranked PvP, I think I can feel when I help winning those games or not. If you think all the things I quickly described are not helpful to your team in ways thief is uniquely good at, then I can’t help you. You should learn Conquest more before trying to play Thief.

One thing I will never disagree, playing Thief isn’t easy. But that will never mean its a bad class. And yes, the class itself has issues that need developer’s attention. But until they do something, the meta build is good enough to be a top PvP class.

Thief is doing fine, please stop those threads t_t

Cynz.9437:

Nocta.5274:

nearlight.3064:

Don’t think about thief as killing everyone in sight. Thats the job of bruiser based classes that are tanky and can stack to 25 might in under 20 seconds.

Your job is primarily to use your unparalleled shortbow mobility to force decaps on side nodes first, and to use SR/SA traits to rez downed allies, since stealth prevents stomps, so unless they have very heavy cleave and see it coming they won’t be able to stop you.

As for actual fighting, have your team call targets for you so you can enter a fight after getting a decap and take down a target thats low and blew all of its cooldowns, while doing the same job of +1ing a 1v1 on a side node. Don’t 1v1 yourself unless its another thief, but you should be able to take on other zerker classes depending on their build, such as zerk staff ele, power engi/war, etc. Especially don’t 1v1 builds with high sustain or tons of active defense.

^ This.

Playing Thief in conquest require you a very different mentality.
You’re here to make your team win, never forget about that.

You mean getting carried by the team? Because thief with bad/average team has 0 influence on outcome of the match.

Whole decapping works only if your team can actually win/hold outnumbered fights.

Whole +1 only works if your teammates is really good at 1v1 and almost killed enemy anyway.

Want to know a scoop ?
By decapping and +1 correctly, YOU are the one carrying the team, not the other way around

You really think your team mate who is holding close is thinking he’s carrying you when you come get rid of that D/D ele harassing him ? Then come back mid faster than any other class and get a game changing stealth rez ? Then use your unparalleled chasing power to finish any runners to help secure your lead ?

This is what Thief excels at. You did your job as a thief, to be useful to the team in ways Thief is incontestably the best at. And maybe it’s harder in pug because you can’t help clueless teams, but we don’t balance kitten for those people.

If this isn’t the role you like in conquest mode, don’t play Thief. If you want to kill people, play signet Necro or D/D Ele.