Guild Wars 2

laquito.5269:

Actually I think the thief is more or less balanced as of now (but then again I main a thief). As somebody said on this forum thiefs do extremly well against players, who don’t know how to play their class properly and thats exactly the reason for me, why so many people whine about thieves. The only build I’d consider overpowered is the p/d condition build, maybe due to the culling problems, maybe not – who knows? Maybe things would be better if attacks from stealth, particulary backstab and sneak attack had a cooldown of like 5 – 8 seconds? On the other side it might also break the builds, not being able to stack proper amounts of bleed anymore. Either way if you’re going to give a cooldown on stealth attacks you’ll have to buff us otherwise.

Anyway, some suggestions:

- reduce backstab damage by max. 10%
- increase dancing dagger damage by max. 20 – 25% (really its not viable anymore having gapclosers like heartseeker, which is almost spammable)
- decrease the damage of heartseeker (at least the below 25%), but leave range, rooting and initiative (max 4.) as it is
—> should be more of a gap closer than a OMFG 4500dmg spammable finisher
- d/d autoattack increase by 5%
- make p/p viable, also bodyshot & headshot need some love imo
- shortbow auto attack could use some faster traveling arrows, same for infiltrators arrow
- increase pistol auto attack or give us a trait for 1200 range
- revealed status is alright being 3seconds, but seems bugged sometimes as I get it for no reason, maybe thats just me
- trait 33% more movement speed while stelthed doesnt seem to work (?)

We don’t have anything viable besides heavy damage output, therefore thieves have to hit hard and then disengage, thats just the way a assassin works. Personally I would wait and see how things are when there are no culling problems anymore, because I do think thats a major factor for the huge amount of whine.

If they reduce the damage on steal and backstab to a reasonable amount, then it wouldn’t be so bad. The thing is, if a thief misses their first 2 button burst combo due to the enemy using utilities, they can shadowstep away and come back in less than 4 seconds, and re-do the combo before utilities are back up. For 10 – 24k damage every 4 seconds, that is a broken mechanic.

Or at the very least make armor / toughness scale better vs. backstab / steal (mug). I honestly do not care about CnD stealthing people, just the outrageous damage of backstab.

I was doing this pretty decently today 2v1 and 3v1, until a thief got in. Then I went from feeling awesome to dead in 3 hits. Its just ruining this game for me. I like being rewarded for outplaying people and using my skills / dodges at the correct times. But I blew all utilities to avoid thief initial burst, then just got smacked with it again 4 seconds later. Instant dead. But theives will defend this till the end. Running a 3k+ Armor build with 1k healing power

Ok… Explain this, im not a glass cannon, 2800 armor, 2900 armor when in earth attunement, dead in under 2 seconds and never even see the enemy. This is why people left the game, this is what they need to fix. It wouldn’t be so hard to fight back if you could see them…. And no do not say L2P because everyone knows thieves can just stealth several times to stay invis until they fight someone. Even then, 2 – 3 seconds of “revealed” doesn’t give people enough time to see them as the “revealed” debuff is off as soon as they get enough initiative to go invis again.

Absolutely 0 time to use a Cantrip to negate any damage. Arcane shield never pops up when the damage is all done in a matter of 0.5 – 2 seconds.

EDIT::: Just did some more testing with 3k+ armor and 1k Healing power. Did not die at all 2 entire games (no thieves in game).
People were getting aggravated that they couldn’t kill me, thief comes in, starts burst, I use utilities to avoid burst, 3 seconds later, all utilities on CD, thief does second burst… 3 hits, dead. Steal CnD Backstab over 3k armor, instant death.

EDIT: Added Video with 3k Armor test.
http://youtu.be/GZO1DErY4tw

Can we please use this slot to put any Utility in… I know it is for the “elite” skills, however, by allowing for us to put an Elite or any other utility (besides a healing one) in this slot, would create a whole new ball game when it comes to build diversities…

Gwalchgwn.1659:

Shadowsteps doesn’t cross jumps. The ledge jumping you refer to flyfunner is only when there is a way up to the ledge within certain distance. And you’ll still have to aim the shot on the edge or it’ll fail.

I have seen in sPvP from below the keep in the map with Svanir (name escapes me at this time), a thief teleport up to the Capture point from down by the statue on the ground where the 2 teams roads meet… I have also seen them bypass the gates to get to the lords by shadowstepping onto the walls of the bases. Or shadowstepping onto rock ledges that have a 0 chance to get to on normal means. Or even shadowstep at keep cap point up onto the little ledge (the part where u come from behind the keep). Where Lightning Flash will show a green marker it just flashes us below the ledge and not up onto it. I believe this is what the OP is referring to.

Dynia.9574:

Can some1 explain me why ppls think thief is op cause I rly don’t get it.

1. My memser kill them easy trolling around with clones no matter what build he is backstabber or pistol whisp or pistols or what ever (lot of tou)

2. My bunker engi laugh a lot too even if 2 thiefs jump on me reflect kill them when I do nothing just tank (lot of tou and hp)

3. My guardian loling around too cause they can’t do NOTHING to him, guardian just over heal their dmg (lot of tou and healing)

4. My necro conditioner/tank just make on them 10 bleeds and they mostly gone with doing nothing (lot of tou hp and condi dmg)

5. Warrior half bunker with shouts loling around too cause heal > thier dmg (lot of tou healing and hp and condi dmg)

6. As plaing as thief there is no way to kill any bunker in 1v1 while you get owned badly tell me more thiefs is op when there is immortal bunkers in 1v3 in game

7. Only class that got right to use berserker is thief, rest of you change your builds a bit and you will get profit, cause if you play glass cannon other glass canon kill you easy, don’t QQ if you got 0 def and hp you get owned by 1 combo from thief cause my heros got lot of tou and hp and can can even 3 thief when jump on me easy
thief glass canon > any other glass canon in game

Video or its not true… Just saying. Also, being forced Toughness / Healing on all characters to deal with 1 profession? That’s not a good thing.

Possibly on a cooldown of 90 seconds (average for traits), but tooltip may be incorrect.

Aervius.2016:

Otaur.9268:

You obviously do not understand. It says, armor/toughness does nothing to( lessen the severity of) the damage. Please at the very least learn to read before posting.

" Armor / Toughness does nothing to mitigate the damage and I know this for a fact. " -literally copy/pasted from your comment.

You obviously can’t very plainly see what was written. If you meant something else, you should have typed it. You can’t insult someone for “not reading my intended message” because they read the message you actually posted.

You actually believe armor and toughness help u versus a steal-cnd-bs combo? Please go make an ele, do not use protection, and test it yourself. I know protection works because without it I got hit for over 10k damage by backstab. Then with protection on by same thief backstab did 8001 damage, a damage reduction of 33% (protection). Now if armor/toughness scaled better, wouldn’t that damage change depending on armor? I have run 1800 armor to 3000 armor. The backstab combo does roughly the same damage. Therefore armor and toughness is not scaling well or at all versus high burst, making it pointless. At least on elementalist. Why do you think ele’s basically ignore earth for arcane and water.

Mankrik.3678:

Otaur.9268:

@Kurow funny you haven’t seen Steal-CnD-BS combo in 2.5 – 3 months because game has only been out 3 months. Stop defending a broken class. Armor / Toughness does nothing to mitigate the damage and I know this for a fact. I have experimented with builds on my ele ranging from 2k armor to 3k armor. Steal still does around 4k dmg, CnD around 4k and backstab ranges between 4k-11k. You are spending so much time trying to defend the class and refusing to see how broken it actually is. No one should be able to go invisible and then unexpectedly unleash 20k+ dmg in 3 buttons and be able to shadowstep away and go invisible and run far enough away to never worry about being caught.

Even regen thieves have a 4k dmg steal, which makes bunker ele’s dmg useless. You can unload all you want onto a regen thief he will just stealth and regen full while just using steal / cluster bomb / trick shot until you are dead.

Quoted for great justice. “Armor/toughness does nothing to mitigate the damage and I know this for a fact.” Seriously. Seriously dude? This word does not mean what you think it means.

You obviously do not understand. It says, armor/toughness does nothing to( lessen the severity of) the damage. Please at the very least learn to read before posting.

@Kurow funny you haven’t seen Steal-CnD-BS combo in 2.5 – 3 months because game has only been out 3 months. Stop defending a broken class. Armor / Toughness does nothing to mitigate the damage and I know this for a fact. I have experimented with builds on my ele ranging from 2k armor to 3k armor. Steal still does around 4k dmg, CnD around 4k and backstab ranges between 4k-11k. You are spending so much time trying to defend the class and refusing to see how broken it actually is. No one should be able to go invisible and then unexpectedly unleash 20k+ dmg in 3 buttons and be able to shadowstep away and go invisible and run far enough away to never worry about being caught.

Even regen thieves have a 4k dmg steal, which makes bunker ele’s dmg useless. You can unload all you want onto a regen thief he will just stealth and regen full while just using steal / cluster bomb / trick shot until you are dead.

What i found sad was when I went 30 fire 30 air 10 water (just for a bit of fun) in sPvP. Came up versus a Ranger who just ran in circles as I pounded on him. He just laughed and pops Regen and heals faster than I can damage him. On another note, Lightning Whip is about as useless as ever, if the target moves it misses, or even swinging at the Windows in Kylo it misses, point blank.

When I spec bunker, I still get hit like a truck, when other classes spec bunker, they become ultimate regen tanks, even thieves can do this!

We do require more skill than other classes, but I believe the OP is trying to say, why are we not Rewarded for having to balance skills / timing things and not spamming 2 – 3 buttons like other professions.

garethh.3518:

xbutcherx.3861:

At this moment is impossible to die in 1 hit by a thief not even with 10 stacks of might. Unless you are half or almost dead that we have a trait that does 20% more damage when target is below 50%. So please stop with this nonsense.

By 1 hit… he means 1 combo…
And yeah thieves can commonly near entirely down people in one BasiliskVenom->mug->C&D->backstab->22….

@choban – Correct, I work very hard using certain skills and dodges at correct timing to stay alive, just to be at 50% and be instantly downed by 1 Backstab. See below for more details.

@Jericho – Unfortunately I think you are right. I am going to have to move to a Glass Cannon (hope to kill them before they burst me) kind of deal. Only thing I don’t like about GC is once they find out your GC, they target you inevitably.

@NevirSayDie – I try to focus on 5 v 5 sPvP because like I said I am casual player. But have been running into a lot of rank 30+ in 5/5 matches who are dueling. I try to join in as much as I can, and have learned a lot about dealing with different classes. Especially mesmers. However, I hate when thieves disappear and run away from fight and by time they reveal they to far away to Tab target. At the least as an Ele, people can see where I have run off to.

@xbutcherx, I am not talking about 1 combo, I can avoid the combo. However it is 1 hit that I am referring to. I have 15 – 16k life, this is not a L2P issue as I get complimented all the time by tpvp players who are impressed by me. And if I didn’t make it clear, I hate the stealth aspect of the 2 classes. Mesmer has ton’s of evade options / distractions even if they don’t spec bunker. Thief also has the ability to evade just by using attacks, and to escape unseen.

@Psikerlord – I do not mind losing 2 v 1. Matter of fact I usually don’t lose (don’t kill them either), I hold the enemies attention until backup can arrive and we can take the point. What I was saying was it’s ridiculous to be downed by 1 hit from half life with Protection boon up (33% reduction on damage). Being hit for 8k with protection on… That means without Protection the 1 backstab would have done 10,640 damage with 1 button… This means if a thief sits back and watches from a distance he/she can stealth in behind someone mid-fight and instantly down them, I do not see how this can be considered good. But a lot of players say it is a “tactic” for being a glass cannon… Maybe I do just suck at this game, or I can believe that something is not balanced fully, which I will go with the balance issue. I am by no chance a Pro who plays 8 hours a day, but I know my profession, I know what attunements to go into and when I should hit my “Oh Sh..” button to get the heck out of there. Not having a chance to hit those buttons because insta-gibbed, that’s my problem.

I don’t know about everyone else, but I am getting very bored with the same old routine. How are thieves not a broken class? Or mesmers? Everyone I talk to says Elementalist is the broken class because we can “bunker and survive” yet I see no one complaining that Thieves who spec bunker have more survivability and damage.. Or mesmers are the same problem. Constantly going invis, constant evade attack skills, several dazes in a row, repeatedly.

It has gotten to the point where if I join a game and the enemy is running 2+ mesmers or Thieves, I just leave. I can deal with 90% of them 1v1 but the moment you get caught by 2 of either of these classes, you are done for.

As a bunker ele running protection constantly up (that’s 33% damage reduction) I still get backstabbed for 50% my life in 1 hit. Not 2 – 3 hits, but 1. I have roughly 15 – 16k life and with protection I get BS on average of 8000 dmg. This is not fun. One second you are holding someone or even 2 people at bay. Granted doing no damage because of the build we are forced into, just to get instantly downed without the chance to even use a skill. This is NOT fun.

If you guys are having fun then I congratulate you all, but until some major balance changes comes around, I find myself (even though I only play once or twice a week) not wanting to log in anymore. There just seems like nothing to do, and pvp is full of the same builds.

Have fun guys, I had high hope for this game, and it would seem it was something I should never of had. Was fun in Beta’s, now it is just, bleh.

D/D + Evasive Arcana = Uber heals in water, Dodge heal with 1k Healing = about 2 – 3k every 9 second dodge.

I would like an option to disable the Auto Score popup at 500 points. This really interferes with a fight in progress. I understand the match is over, but when in a middle of the fight a big screen pops up, it gets annoying. Kind of like the thing at beginning of matches, we have the option to close it and to re-open it via ‘N’, but the Score board doesn’t need to auto popup. Please add in a disable feature for auto-scoreboard.

Thanks!

I admit I used to cry nerf to bs thieves, however with my latest build I can make bs thief moot. Condition/regen thieves are a pain. Can only remove so many conditions.

seraphenslaved.6235:

:) glad some folks agree. This is a profession where the player makes or breaks it. I’ve fought against bad eles of all builds and great eles too. It’s not class mechanics that inhibit us, its decision making and quick thinking. So many times I’ve ended up somewhere I shouldn’t be…like 1v5s on a point. Nothing an earthquake followed by RTL couldn’t fix lol.

(If I was Dapheonix the 1v5 would be easy lol. Props to him)

I swear that man doesn’t use a keyboard but a magnetic link to his brain so he can just think what he wants it to do… I watch some of these videos of all these ele’s in pvp and they hitting like 3 – 4 buttons at once.

I don’t know about you all, but if I hit 3 buttons at a time on my laptop, it doesn’t work in game.

So if I am holding W+D for my running diagonal and i hit an attunement key or a skill button, it will not work unless i let go of W or D.

Tried to roll a thief, mesmer, engi, warror, guardian, ranger, necro… After leveling my ele to 80 and practice a crap ton in sPvP… Can’t do it. They are to boring, not enough going on. I was actually called unstoppable tonight in sPvP, made me feel good, because I have invested so much time into learning the char, the combos, what attunement to switch to and when, what utilities to use vs certain classes, etc.

I feel if I did not lag in game, or my laptop keyboard would respond to me hitting the Attunement swap keys was more responsive, I would not die except in 3 v 1 situations. Nothing more frustrating than 2 v 1 and getting 1 downed just to have other revive them while ur knockback / knockdown on cooldowns. Or when u go to stomp and they both interrupt you. Just saying, lol.

Epilog.2168:

I gotta say i rly dont even have a problem with damage. I run scepter/dagger and easily take out most classes, except kitten stealth specced thiefs(Burn in hell). You really just have to practice and have the correct armor/runes to make a big difference. Spent a bit of time testing different builds, theres only 2 i have liked. Both of which are scepter/dagger.

I hate mesmers as much as i do thieves… Thieves atleast die in a few hits, mesmers just keep disappearing and summoning those kitten clones, or distortion or use sword evade attacks… Quite a pain

/quote:
11. Bugs and lack of communication about bugs are demoralizing. /end quote.

10: Conjure Fire Greatsword does some wicked damage, but we take a severe hit to survivability when/if we use it.
12: We would like an out of combat weapon swap ability
13: Return Attunement cooldowns to 9 seconds, and add a different bonus to Arcane
13 Continued: Maybe make a Lingering Duration % Bonus to increase linger attunements effect?

The build I run gives me even offense and defense, however I lack the condition removals from water. I can change up the cantrips give vigor and regen, but then I lose out on the regen and gain an extra condition removal. However atm, i am relying on the Cleansing cantrip to remove 4 at once, and get out of bad situations (RTL).

Stin.9781:

I’dd like to check some things out.
2day met a realy awsome elementalist, as ussualy i was not expecting any collosal damage, however his RTL, updraft + some third skill combo chained 10k + burn that would take off some 2-3k damage of my life.

As having 16k hp,(mind that im a thief with 16k hp and 2500 armor is not a full glass cannon) i found it amusing. While combo was dodgable, if it hit you withouth stunbreaker, i would end up toasted. He also had considerable survival, and often protection.

I’d like to test that build out for myself, however i got no idea which one it is. Could you please post supposed build here ?

^_^ I have been testing a jack of all trade build that may have been fighting you today… It is more a theory-craft build, but it is pretty versatile. Decent damage and a little bit of survivability.

I can keep up decent damage, fury, protection, swiftness, some regen / vigor, etc.
Was the name Otaur Blackfang ? If so I can give you my test spec.

Been noticing a lot of Auramancer’s popping up, i think Elementalist is becoming the new Flavor of the Month.

TxJBxT.9370:

Alright. Anyone have a lvling build? I’m lvl 12.

I leveled with D/D and Staff. Staff for dynamic events to tag more mobs and stay at range. D/D I just Burning Speed / RoF / Eq / Churn Earth / Shocking Aura (Unless facing knockback / interrupt mobs) then dont do the Churn, but Switch to Water as you may have taken some damage by now.

I suggest 10 in Water or Arcane to start your trials. 10 in Water with a Remove Conditions on entering water will make those Risen a lil bit easier to deal with (if you are in Sylvari lands). The extra vitality is also nice to have. Then I would do 10 in air, for Air 1 trait, Aura’s grant fury / swiftness. Again this is just the way I played. So many ways to level an Ele. You can actually level with staff pretty well. 20 Arcane + Air for crits and do Arcane trait 8 for Large Area of Effects with Staff. If you dont go air for crit and go Fire for raw damage, just do 10% dmg will in fire so your lava font does more with the increased aoe size to tag more monsters. This game isnt about fully killing a monster, but tagging those being killed by others.

Dynamic event chains are your friend. Find them, use them, and use other players (sounds dirty!) But thats how you can level faster. Tag Tag Tag. Your the slowest on the playground and must catch everyone else, so we cheat a little and throw a rock or 2 at their targets!
Bad analogy I know, but Im in a funny mood!

Best of luck!

Throw a Sigil of Minor Accuracy on the focus (+10 Precision per kill thing) Helps with the crit chance. Change Arcane 5 to Arcane 6 for Vigor on crit. You will maintain quite a bit of buffs.

Cosmic Teapot.9162:

PinCushion.7390:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xy6xpGGubCk

I was referring to stuff like the above video. We can’t really do that anymore.

Is that so?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OX9htqJQoSU

You keep re-posting this video over and over, however it is NOT Viable at all. If you compare Beta version versus your new one, he does not have to put all his skills on 45 second cooldowns to do it. You do.

If you want to be taken seriously, play a few maps with that spec, do not EDIT out all your dieing and show us how Viable it is. The point is, you cannot. And showing us damage versus a Practice Dummy of how much damage you can do metaphorically, is not proof.

Running a bunker spec ele, we can outlast some people for a good while. But the moment a glass cannon backstab thief comes into play, 7.5k backstab on a Bunker build, thats over half life. Add in another stealth, backstab, cloak dagger, heartseekers which hit 4k. This video shows an ele who maxed out 30 fire 30 air and probably 10 water for dmg to vulnerable targets. All this build shows is that we can kill an AFK target, who does nothing to fight back, by blowing ALL our cooldowns.

We cannot use fire grab 2x – 3x in a Row unlike backstab. So even if they managed to get this off, he is instantly dead by anyone around.

boozer.7815:

Solori.6025:

Ima leave this here

http://youtu.be/8BDQGDELcUk

ele hitting firegrab for 13k

That was classic. Ive never seen damage on it for more than 8k. That Ele’s build must be very high crit.

My personal best is about 9k… I am running a 20 30 0 0 20 build though. The person in that video is running something like 30 30 10 0 0 or 30 30 0 10 0. I know 0 arcane because of the 15 second cooldown on attunements. I would shoot for the 30 30 10 0 0 build though, because the Earthquake may have +10% dmg, air +20% to players knocked down + 20% to those under 25% life, +10% in air, Power Plus Might for each fire spell, +10% damage, +5% to burning targets.

That is only a guess, but that seems to be accurate. He may also be using Might on Weapon swap sigils, as I see him get 9 stacks of might without combo fields. So i’d say 2 sigils of battle. He is definitely 30 air, because his target becomes vulnerable on crit, meaning another 10% damage boost.

Hope this helps you to see what happened in that video…

What you are not seeing: If the thief wasn’t afk and responded with a Evade based attack, teleport, etc, Ele would have died in 2 – 3 hits. Basically 5 buttons less than what the Ele had to use.

Neoeve.5461:

i havent seen bot trains indeed…but i have seen something else
a player gathering a tree\node\herb then disappears, then appears near another to gather then disappears again and so on
I dunno if this is a bug, exploit, new hack or me becoming crazy…i’ve seen it more than once though.

Oh thank god, I thought I was going crazy… Saw this happening too, and the guy appeared / disappeared so fast that I couldn’t even report him. Some sort of Teleport hack or something. Going node to node….

offence.4726:

This complain about thieves is getting real old , running a class cannon thief is the hardest thing basically your stuck into a 14k health pool even the slightest aoe or dmg gets you downed. Most of the qqers don’t know hot to properly trait or use the proper skills, learn to use a stunbreaker ? not to mention they lack the game mechanic knowledge and they come here and qq instead of learning to play the game.

Here is a challenge for you good sir… Create an elementalist, spec 30 Fire (power) 30 air (crit) and 10 into whatever you want. Use berserker amulet with any ruins you want. Now, fraps / video capture it, and see how long you live with 14k life as a Full Burst Ele. As a full burst ele we can almost equal the damage of a thief, however, we do not have the luxury of being invisible 90% of the fight. Attacking so fast its pathetic to watch how slow an Ele cast his spells. Ever seen a downed thief? It’s like they are on Speed or something, just bambambambambam, so fast… compared to bam…….bam…… mist form….. bam…….. earth grasp. stomped.

Dagger dagger is a good way to start, or scepter dagger if you are going more 1 v 1. My personal best with scepter was 9k damage with the 20% dmg to players under 25% life + 10% fire damage + 5% damage versus burning targets + fire grab vs burning target. Player was at about 10% life when used fire grab and he was burning + crit made it a nice 9k, then instantly dead to next person in line.

Any class can spec Glass Cannon, but not all of them have the luxury of being unseen / teleport 3x to get away.

Good luck with the challenge.

shaolin.9716:

We don’t really know enough about the fight the OP was in. Maybe he really was more skilled than those other 2 players and perhaps deserved to win. I’m not sure if anyone could pull it off against 3 though even if no thief was involved, it’s probably best to flee a 3v1 with no incoming support.

However, thieves do have damage that is too high and too easy to land. When I tried one I was dropping people like flies before I even knew what half my abilities did and used absolutely no utility skill. Building a glass canon thief and unloading your initiative on someone you tunnel vision is enough to drop him.

I was trying to wait for backup, I believe I was on mansion cap point right near enemy base. The point was to outlast the 2, but got insta-dead by a 3 button combo.

Jackie.1829:

Thieves exist to kill bunkers anyways, if we didnt have classes capable of bursting high numbers then bunkers would be immortal in tpvp and nodes would never flip in competitive play. It is already a fine line with some top teams running 3 guardians.

My only gripe is that the thief can execute the combo so easily. I rather ooo the combo be possible but take more skill to produce so not everybody can do it but only the handful of really good players. I do agree that for hot join it kind of breaks the game because anybody can run around and deal massive damage but the players against them cant counter it due to inexperience (mind you I am saying the thief is also inexperienced, as is the average player in hot join, but the combo can be executed even by an inexperienced player).

Anet should seek to make the combo harder to execute in some way, but retain the damage output.

Hmm, I like this solution… Make the combo more skill based and not a 2-3 button instant win.

Raytek.6193:

Otaur.9268:

Im so tired of going into a game full of thieves and they run around stealthed so you can’t even see them and kill you in 3 hits.

>First off, don’t look to 8v8 for balance. That’s your first problem. Thieves can’t “run around stealth” they have shadow refuge which is on a minute cooldown and stealths them for 10 second among a few other skills with provide short 3 second stealths.

Its NOT fun, and it is the stupidest thing I have EVER witnessed. How is this a Balanced game. Even with 3k Armor they do on average 5k+ a hit with Backstab. I will be in middle of 2 v 1 and not doing bad and BAM, insta-death from the unseen. This is absolutely pathetic Arena Net. Bring back Pre-BWE3 Balance, atleast the game was fun in Beta. Now it is just Flavor of the Month professions using the same Backstab build. You knew about this BEFORE last patch, yet you did nothing to fix this issue. Absolutely frustrating knowing we are being ignored…

>Yeah, 1v3 is usually instant death regardless of the class you’re playing.

Otaur.9268:

Edit: Sorry, I am an Elementalist, was running conditon/heal build at the time. I was doing fine versus 2 people, just keeping the point contested when I got jumped from full life to none instantly. I don’t care who you are, if you are watching 2 people and managing your heals/knockdowns/utilities, if you got smacked for over 15k in under a second, you wouldn’t be able to do anything.

>Whatever build you were running must’ve been very squishy. A thief doesn’t hit you for 9k backstabs unless you’re a glass cannon. You got “smacked for over 15k in under a second” because you had bad awareness and didn’t anticipate the thief’s burst. If you had seen it coming you could have EASILY popped mist form/earth shield after the start of his burst and healed back up. You would have died with 3 people attacking you but it wouldn’t have been a 1 second insta-kill that I always here people complaining about.

This is not a L2P issue. This is from a different match, but it pretty much sums it up… Everyone keeps saying L2P, frankly, I only have problems with Thieves and Mesmers. I can spec Glass cannon if I want, matter of fact after making this post I said screw it, I die in 3 hits, I might as well do some damage. As of right now I am running a 20 20 0 10 20 build doing 1k – 5k dmg depending on the skill used. But that is only versus other people with glass cannon. If u cant out bunker them, then try to burst them before they burst you I guess.

>This isn’t a game balanced around 1v1s. With a bunker build you won’t kill anyone (you’ll eventually win a 1v1 against a glass cannon if they’re stupid and keep fighting you) and as a burst elementalist expect to have a hard time because your class doesn’t benefit much from speccing entirely into damage.

And if you played Beta you would know what I meant by the Reverse balance. Back when Ele Fire Grab did 10k + dmg. We got nerfed almost instantly, but another class with just as much if not more survivability in glass cannon spec, doesn’t receive the nerf. At the very least, Ele’s have Cooldowns to make this kind of damage temporary… It is not spammable like initiative based attacks.

>It got nerfed instantly because it WAS OP. You’re forgetting that elementalists aren’t supposed to be played as glass cannons. You actually do have a lot of survivability and even as tanky-DPS aren’t focused first in fights. Fire grab was hitting way too high and that’s just a fact. Thieves have incredibly low survivability, they melt in team fights and can’t fight in melee range for very long before they’re focused and dead. Thieves have cooldowns too. Their burst damage is high but they rely on skills like Venoms/Steal/Haste to be able to do that burst. Much like 100b warrior, if they miss that they’ve basically lost a lot of their spike potential. Initiative on Thief is mainly used for for utility, not burst damage.

I was not in 8v8, I was not running a squishy build. If you took the time to read, 3k armor is a toughness / condition build. My point of this is the fact armor means absolutely nothing. Being in a 2v1, a lot of my utilities were on cooldown. The map was khylo, the thief was never visible for me to even ready a counter. I went from 75% life to 0 instanty. The image I provided is from a different match, but sums up what I dislike. I knew this thread would turn into a l2p thread, because those who like broken mechanics will defend those broken mechanics. Guess I will keep tweaking my build until I feel like we are on a level playing field.

evilapprentice.6379:

Killthehealersffs.8940:

So i should check the wiki next time , in order to correct my vocabulary and oppl take me serious eh ? :P
Evasive attacks doesnt neglect any kind of attacks ? Like dodge ?

You can’t recall the classes main mechanic, but you claim to know it well enough to sit here and tell me thieves have enough dodges and evasive attacks to make up for the complete lack of defensive boons and immunity skills.

My point is, you don’t know what you’re talking about. You’ve lost some fights to some annoying stealth spam thieves, had your incorrect opinion validated by other thief hating players on the boards and confirmation bias, and rather than take someones opinion and think it through, you bash it because it came from a thief. You don’t really know what you’re talking about, but in your heart you know its wrong because a thief said it, and “they’re OP”.

Right or wrong, nobody would take me seriously if I said “Man, warrior keeps owning me with his good sword whenever he uses bunch o swings, or whatever its called”.

I fought an amazingly skilled thief recently, as a bunker / condition elementalist, this thief never went below half life. He utilized high healing / toughness and had roughly 5 – 6 boons constantly, regen in stealth which pretty much healed him to full, while slowly wearing everyone around him down by making them use all their cooldowns for condition removals. I think that Thief was excellently skilled and was not the Flavor of the Month thieves you see most people playing.

However, Killthehealer speaks the truth, with the initiative system a thief specced in the Backstab cannon spec can dish out way to much damage even to bunker builds, ask me how I know or just check my post history. To be honest, the thief is a Wonderful profession idea on paper, however it’s actual gameplay needs to be monitored very closely by ArenaNet, otherwise, the being Overpowered issue, is and will still be true, until they fix the damage to be on par with other glass cannon builds. Lower the damage from 8 – 12k to 3 – 6k, that would balance it out more.

This is however only my opinion, and I know 90% of thieves will disagree, and the other 10% don’t play Cannon specs.

Socram.6587:

So you want to revert the game back to a build where the culling bug still existed in sPvP? Yeah right, this would definitely enhance your chances vs. Thieves

I’m not usually the guy to say this, but this is a l2p issue. With good map awareness it’s very difficult to be surprised by a Thief, their Stealth usually doesn’t last that long. And even if they do, you could pop a defensive cooldown or dodge immediately after getting hit by an unknown source.
If you have no def.cd available/ready or are running around with glasscannon gear&spec, then they should be able to kill you fast when adding into a 1v1. Nothing wrong with that imho.

Edit: Sorry, I am an Elementalist, was running conditon/heal build at the time. I was doing fine versus 2 people, just keeping the point contested when I got jumped from full life to none instantly. I don’t care who you are, if you are watching 2 people and managing your heals/knockdowns/utilities, if you got smacked for over 15k in under a second, you wouldn’t be able to do anything.

This is not a L2P issue. This is from a different match, but it pretty much sums it up… Everyone keeps saying L2P, frankly, I only have problems with Thieves and Mesmers. I can spec Glass cannon if I want, matter of fact after making this post I said screw it, I die in 3 hits, I might as well do some damage. As of right now I am running a 20 20 0 10 20 build doing 1k – 5k dmg depending on the skill used. But that is only versus other people with glass cannon. If u cant out bunker them, then try to burst them before they burst you I guess.

And if you played Beta you would know what I meant by the Reverse balance. Back when Ele Fire Grab did 10k + dmg. We got nerfed almost instantly, but another class with just as much if not more survivability in glass cannon spec, doesn’t receive the nerf. At the very least, Ele’s have Cooldowns to make this kind of damage temporary… It is not spammable like initiative based attacks.

Im so tired of going into a game full of thieves and they run around stealthed so you can’t even see them and kill you in 3 hits. Its NOT fun, and it is the stupidest thing I have EVER witnessed. How is this a Balanced game. Even with 3k Armor they do on average 5k+ a hit with Backstab. I will be in middle of 2 v 1 and not doing bad and BAM, insta-death from the unseen. This is absolutely pathetic Arena Net. Bring back Pre-BWE3 Balance, atleast the game was fun in Beta. Now it is just Flavor of the Month professions using the same Backstab build. You knew about this BEFORE last patch, yet you did nothing to fix this issue. Absolutely frustrating knowing we are being ignored…

I know previously in one of the Live Q&A’s one of you were playing a mesmer, one was playing an Ele, the Ele repeatedly died (think it was Jon Peters) this wasn’t due to his lack of skill, this is due to the Nerfs they through out BWE3. Im probably going to get banned from the Forums again for this, but this has got to stop. We feel like you are ignoring everything that is posted on here, and you only answer posts that have no relevance to the issues. And usually an answer is “Thread Merged – So we know where NOT to look.”

Done, I am trying so hard to like this game, waited so long for it, loved it in Beta, then it was ruined on Release.

Wow…. So since Beta I have been playing without the buffs that others have? No wonder why everyone said it was easy to get gear / materials / gold / etc… And I have been having a tough time. Lol

Whats the easiest way to tell besides watching for WvW reset.

This is why I hate thieves…. didn’t even have time to mist form 16,355 damage in 3 hits, and I only have about 14.5k life. But I guess its cool, because they die in 3 hits too right?

How I handle them, after the patch I completely changed my play style. I decided I have been bunker long enough… Now I am 100% offensive. IT is awesome when someone comes up to you thinking, “Yes, another bunker to kill” only to turn around and get hit for 4.5k (personal best atm) with a fire grab. Usually get jumped by 2 or more players, and manage to get one downed, but they usually revive other before my interrupts are off CD. This can be disheartening knowing I got 1 downed but fail to get the kill because of 2 v 1, but I still fight back. I have been having a blast on the Keep map with Lords. Had a few people trying to kill our Lord, so I held them both off long enough for a teammate to help back me up.
EDIT:: I have been playing in the 5 vs 5 sPvP matches now that we have them.

I guess I should also mention, I just hit rank 11, while the players I have been facing are ranks 20+ with more sPvP time than me and Champion Slayer titles. I do not know exactly how much time it takes to get this title, but it sure feels good knowing I am putting up a decent fight.

On the other hand, I kind of wish I had a little more damage boost, as I am specced for Offense, I do die fairly quickly to other Offense specced professions who do about 8k – 12k in 1 or 2 hits. Very upsetting to know I have Low Hp, Low Armor, and Mediocre damage. My 4.5k Was a crit on a Burning target with Fire Grab, nothing compared to BWE2 where I could average almost 10 – 15k with Fire Grab crit on Burning target. Major nerf I guess they put in BWE3 as I did not play my ele BWE3, but played a Ranger instead.

Best of luck, also, remember to time dodge, use utilities if needed.
I also play D/D

This was suggested back in Beta Weekend 1… Guess it just wasn’t looked at. Again +1 for this as I have family members who are color blind to red/green.

Heimlich.3065:

kostbabis.8791:

pls bring it back

I’m pretty sure that won’t happen. Remember that they removed the blast finisher (completely) from Dragon’s Tooth too.

Now there are only 2 combo finishers (total) outside of Earth Attunement and utility slots (Comet and Phoenix are the remaining two).

If I was a betting man, I’d wager ANet will remove them (without comment, naturally) in an upcoming “fix”.

The blast finisher on Dragons Tooth is not removed, but now focuses on where the Tooth lands, not centered around the caster.

Feedback: To be 100% honest I feel as if ANet is so worried about content, gear progression, and e-sports, that they have forgotten one major thing… Their own Marketing / Sales pitch. When it’s READY. However, I believe the only thing that was ready was the terrain and art. The game looks absolutely amazing. But all the Professions are poorly balanced, especially those that were announced or created near the beginning, Elementalist being one. 80% of traits just do not work, Arcane is mandatory to have a 9 second cooldown, our attacks are about 70% slower than all others auto attacks, we are easy to dodge, easy to kill, they took away our might stacking, boon durations, and bunker builds. ANet, most of us were bunker because no other builds are viable. Now with 3k+ armor, I find Rangers 6 shotting me. Yea, RANGER, the supposed worst class in the game. Pets hit for 1k – 4k, Rangers melee for 1k – 4k, but they are broken. Sure they have broken skills / traits / utilities, but so does every other profession… I read they just hired a bunch of people for Bot removal and stuff, well a lot of Bots are now gone, how about sticking say 6 of them on the Profession team. That way each one is responsible for a profession. Then our only worries will have to be, “Oh goodie, what is our Developer going to fix for us this patch?” Not, “Oh no a Patch, what are we breaking today?”

For instance, Armor of Earth trait (not the skill) never goes off… Magnetic Grasp after today’s lovely patch, also still stuck in air in-front of target for 4 seconds of free kill. Ride the Lightning + new sPvP map + going off bridge = stuck /no dodge / no waypoint / etc.

We want communication, we want the game most of us played in Beta. Who took over right before BWE3 because whoever that was, completely changed Guild Wars 2. We are now becoming Grind Wars 2, Gear Wars 2, Nerf Wars 2, take your pick. In the end I feel we will be doing something along those lines, Grinding, Gear Farming, or just Nerfed till the character is morphed into a useless state with 3 Ultimate skills… /Dance /Cry /Quit.

Thanks for understanding, and thanks for Alienating all who had hope. I find my time playing less and less with each patch as everyone I know has left and I play alone now. Horrible year for me, 2 Fail titles in a Row… Diablo 3, and now Guild Wars 2. :’(

Undeadkemea.4865:

Tryble.6819:

Otaur.9268:

Guardian can heal 0 to Full health with 1 spell, we cannot.

Are you talking about the 3 minute cooldown, five second cast super obvious “check it out that guardian with the giant book is doing something and its taking him forever lets interrupt him” spell?
Because that’s the only full heal spell there is.

I so wanted to say that aswell xD laughed at the attempt of trolling, atleast I hope he was trolling otherwise he was just not really…thinking it through

I have been in matches where they cast some type of shield and cannot be interrupted. Never played a Guardian so dont know the spells. However I have played Ele since BWE1 and I just want our old Ele’s back, not this Post Launch crap they gave us.

may provide about 10 – 15 more fps.
Additional Build Notes:

We have officially moved over to the new wide-screen FOV (Field of View). If you would prefer to return to the old FOV, please place the following command in your target for the game .exe: -useOldFov

Additional Build Notes:

We have officially moved over to the new wide-screen FOV (Field of View). If you would prefer to return to the old FOV, please place the following command in your target for the game .exe: -useOldFov

The hoser.5143:

Did you guys tweak the FOV? It seems my zoom looks off. Either I zoom in and my feet are cut off or I zoom out and it seems like my character is tiny.

Field of View has been changed for 16:9 monitors, if you like the old fiew, open your shortcut and after your target. “C:/GuildWars2/” (however yours looks) after the end " and -UseOldFOV

Additional Build Notes:

General

Stats of legendary weapons have been returned to normal.
Total achievement points display bug has been fixed.
Ranger traps have been reset to their expected cooldowns.
We have officially moved over to the new wide-screen FOV (Field of View). If you would prefer to return to the old FOV, please place the following command in your target for the game .exe: -useOldFov

Facepunch.5710:

It could have been much worse. They fixed bugs and incongruencies where skills weren’t doing what they were supposed to. Whine more please.

RTL and Magnetic Grasp are still broken Post Patch. 4 seconds floating in air in front of target with Magnetic Grasp, RTL completely locked my char in place during sPvP wouldn’t even allow me to use Way point to get unstuck, couldnt move or dodge…

So no, they didn’t fix the bugs where skills weren’t doing what they were supposed to. But thanks for providing a post to the thread!

@boozer And yes these have been reported.

As an Ele / Ranger player, I think I chose the 2 wrong classes. BWE3 Ranger / Ele both nerfed for being to “Powerful” now we must all wait for the 2 Devs working on classes to fix them. Hang in there guys, atleast this isn’t a monthly sub!

Best of Luck, your fellow Elementalists / Rangers

Yeppers, and Ele magnetic grasp freezes you for 4 seconds in air in front of target. Also RTL on new map causes you to not be able to move if u fall off bridge, so you cant even way point or anything, just a sitting little duck. (Cant dodge either) Lol

After tonight’s patch I thought I should let you all know that this skill now holds you 4 seconds in air right in-front of your target. I will try to Screenshot it next time it happens, after doing several test fights with Svanir in the Mist, I can confirm this is an occasional thing.

Arc.9374:

Otaur, you know Guardias have the same base hitpoints as Elementalists?

Yep. Lowest in the game. Their tankyess comes from gear/traits/stat allocation/weapon choices. The same place ours comes from.

Interesting so same HP+ Heavy Armor = Tough as …

Okay I would like Heavy Armor on my Elementalists. That’d be fair?
3k Armor on my Elementalist and now dieing faster in sPvP. I don’t know what all has changed, just know heartseeker did 2 – 3k a hit, Ranger was doing 1100 every hit before crits, Warrior double chop, about 1200 a hit.

On a Side note: Why does Armor of Earth trait NEVER go off for me… Final shielding works 90% of time, but the armor of earth one never does.