Guild Wars 2

Shockwave.1230:

Sagat.3285:

Shockwave.1230:

If the thief was OP it’d be the only thing people ran in at least one game mode.

S/D Acro Trickery and P/D DeadlyArts ShadowArts potentially should be looked at for nerfs, but the profession doesn’t need a rework.

As it stands though, the profession is not OP.

Let me guess because they are the only “tank” thief builds eh? Stealth and evade eh? Can’t handle a glassy class holding a little longer eh?

Thief user logic: When I go into a toughness(Shadow Arts) or vitality(Acrobatics) trait line I deserve some kind of survivability or else those points I spent are useless.
Thief opponent logic: Why does he survive if he’s a glassy class,why can’t i hit him,why does he do so much damage,why is he so annoying?
GW2 logic: Huh mmm so thief did not become what we expected or did they forget the definition of thief or maybe they only want glass canon thieves. Should we remind them one more time or is it pointless?

I’m guessing Acro Trickery S/D is your response. It’s the best thief build by far. Nothing comes close to its combined mobility, damage, utility, and sustain. A lot of thief builds have a high amount of the first three I mentioned, but adding sustain without adequeating lowering the other three in some way is where the problem lies.

As an FYI, I main a thief in PvP.

One thing evade doesn’t do and stealth does is partial removal of pressure, you can get targeting off,you might have a different position than the attacker(s) believed, you disengage better…
Stealth in some situations is better than evade and worse in others but I would agree either of them is op if thief wasn’t a natural glassy class. Having one or both just makes you normal not tank or maybe most of the users are good because most of the thieves I encounter are glass canons D/P 2/6/0/0/6 with 0 cleansing as long as I see them coming I’m fine but they can’t handle heavy fights.
Both P/D and S/D run 6 in Trickery and 2 in DA only difference SA and Acro. See the pattern? You have to get one of them…

There are none unless you run with team or use GS to evade your way out when close to losing I see that a lot.

Wyrden.4713:

Sagat.3285:

Zacchary.6183:

Neptune.2570:

Couldn’t agree more OP!
Also sometimes when I burst, thieves just dodge it, making my attack useless. So I suggest making thieves unable to dodge, evade or move whenever a warrior attacks.

100b should apply 1s immobilizes for the duration of the channel so the thief doesn’t move.

I’m dying of laughter right now thieves are supposed to be hard to hit and war is supposed to endure the fight we can’t break class roles. I’m not walking around saying " Look at my toughness let me tank through those few skills and play with you."
Make thieves unable to evade burst just for you is very personal you have other skills too and they can help landing that burst skill. Don’t rely on one skill only at least I have to time everything right or I die. It will not matter if 100B immobilizes just stealth of you or I use Shadow Strike.
This is not creativity it feels like we are in anger management don’t let anger blind you that’s thief’s ability.

i think u never heard of sarcasm^

Oh believe me some war would want to that happen. Sure stealth only as one counter skill just be counter player.

Shockwave.1230:

If the thief was OP it’d be the only thing people ran in at least one game mode.

S/D Acro Trickery and P/D DeadlyArts ShadowArts potentially should be looked at for nerfs, but the profession doesn’t need a rework.

As it stands though, the profession is not OP.

Let me guess because they are the only “tank” thief builds eh? Stealth and evade eh? Can’t handle a glassy class holding a little longer eh?

Thief user logic: When I go into a toughness(Shadow Arts) or vitality(Acrobatics) trait line I deserve some kind of survivability or else those points I spent are useless.
Thief opponent logic: Why does he survive if he’s a glassy class,why can’t i hit him,why does he do so much damage,why is he so annoying?
GW2 logic: Huh mmm so thief did not become what we expected or did they forget the definition of thief or maybe they only want glass canon thieves. Should we remind them one more time or is it pointless?

Zacchary.6183:

Neptune.2570:

Couldn’t agree more OP!
Also sometimes when I burst, thieves just dodge it, making my attack useless. So I suggest making thieves unable to dodge, evade or move whenever a warrior attacks.

100b should apply 1s immobilizes for the duration of the channel so the thief doesn’t move.

I’m dying of laughter right now thieves are supposed to be hard to hit and war is supposed to endure the fight we can’t break class roles. I’m not walking around saying " Look at my toughness let me tank through those few skills and play with you."
Make thieves unable to evade burst just for you is very personal you have other skills too and they can help landing that burst skill. Don’t rely on one skill only at least I have to time everything right or I die. It will not matter if 100B immobilizes just stealth of you or I use Shadow Strike.
This is not creativity it feels like we are in anger management don’t let anger blind you that’s thief’s ability.

Off topic discussions we’re focused on thief for some reason not each other. Only solution that make total sense make the light fields capable of revealing and combo finishers through it lengthen the effect this gives guardian a plus for support their main purpose for some reason.
Stop trying to make every profession anti-stealth it is not responsible we can’t remake a whole trait line called Shadow Arts.

Just give those people light fields capable of revealing more reasons to play guardian(and not warrior).

Ross Biddle.2367:

Plenty you could do.

• 50% more incoming damage while in stealth.

• 25% chance of hits cause revealed.

• New utility “Lawyers Bane”, instant banish all thieves in a 1200 radius to the bottom of the ocean where Lawyers are thrown.

So many simple changes that’d make the entire GW2 community immensely happy. Except thieves. Nobody cares about thieves.

Ironically there is a trait that reduce incoming damage while in stealth by 50%.

Arikyali.5804:

SoulstitchMMO.1396:

It doesn’t feel like my Focus wall is pulling them any where. Does any stealth come with some sort of stability? Lots of times on ledges I’ve seen thief to stealth on a ledge, I focus pull them, and they are still on the ledge…

Stealthing doesn’t give stability. Where exactly on the ledge are you trying to pull them? If it’s at a keep or tower, there is a little wall that keeps players from being entirely pulled off. You need to pull them in certain corners of the building, in order to get them.

Edit: Snap, I just realized this thread was necro’d…

Stealth can give you give stability with new Acrobatics trait.

Jekkt.6045:

as a thief why would i even care. if i wanted to i could get some distance between me and the warrior, wait those 4 seconds and have the same result…

sorry but this is the most stupid idea i have ever heard. all i can think of “nerfing” stealth is making the thief flicker for a very short amount of time when you damage him, or as a good start, show damage numbers when you hit the thief with something else than conditions.

There will be more of those threads believe me. The idea of light field revealing is pretty good it will make guardian the ultimate support class.

jportell.2197:

Lol stance’s should not reveal the thief… I can 1HKO a thief with an eviscerate using bersker stance through their blinding powder… Warriors don’t need a new auto win button.

We are talking about in stealth not blindness. You put stance I stealth and let you waste an utility probably only thief and mesmer can do it I don’t know much engi making smoke combo field and blast in mid fight.

Saturn.6591:

Hitman.5829:

Saturn.6591:

How does stealth make them useless?

Are you seriously asking that? Going in stealth and waiting for the skill to fade is what is making the utility skill useless.

Congratz; you did a good job on ignoring the rest of what I’ve written just after the sentence you’ve quoted.

You use the stance because you don’t want to take damage. The Thief is in stealth. You don’t take damage. Stance worked just fine.

Depends on what stance… Frenzy,Balanced and Defiant Stance will be countered by my stealth. That’s a risk of having them but as warrior you should find a way to adapt and not be utility dependent. Stealth is probably the only decent counter to stances.
Us thieves having a warrior counter amazing…..

BobbyT.7192:

Hitman.5829:

Saturn.6591:

How does stealth make them useless?

Are you seriously asking that? Going in stealth and waiting for the skill to fade is what is making the utility skill useless.

Waiting the stance out what your suppose to do though,

Too direct counter but the idea of light fields revealing seem balanced it would make guardian a better support class or maybe OP support.

Those stealth threads tough….

Tien.3865:

I ignore them. Even if you manage to avoid their CnDs, negate their Sneak Attacks, and just outplay them in general, they’ll just stealth and either get away or come back at full health. Complete waste of time. By avoiding p/d thieves, you gain the satisfaction of knowing that you denied them a fight, which is all they want anyway.

It’s called engaging and disengaging it seems that’s the main purpose of thief. All you need to kill me is to be any kind of burst and outplay me because out of stealth I only have 2 evades,no protection,no immunity. But if you can’t do that avoiding P/D seems to be simple for some.
I barely see P/D thieves other than me where do you guys find them? I mainly see the glass canon ones.

Poplolita.2638:

Shemsu.8721:

Poplolita.2638:

Sagat.3285:

Poplolita.2638:

Sagat.3285:

Poplolita.2638:

Xter.6271:

Thieves are not an issue, stealth is not an issue, the issue is people wanting an easy button. You people don’t complain about me stacking my boons through my own combo fields while I damage you and become more of a threat as the fight progresses. The simple solution is to just prevent what is causing the issues from happening and as the old saying goes. “The simplest solution is the best solution”.

Regards,
Xter

I will corrupt boon with some dark path here and there to death!

Yes because every style can be countered but not from all professions.

Ah so now there is a “but”. I was just my way to tell you your analogy doesn’t work. And it still don’t.

What do you mean? Corruption necro counter boon ele better than any other professions the same way good Turret/Rifle Engi counter stealth with CC. Certain professions and builds will do better or worse in some situations what’s wrong with that? Are you supposed to handle perfectly everything with any build on any class?

It’s a hardcounter, what you were describing with stealth were soft counters. Soft counters =/= hardcounters

Your right soft counter =/= hard counter but it is still a counter which by your own admission then stealth has viable counters. If they were to add hard counters, would need to remove soft counters and buff non stealth ALOT to balance. However, none of that needs to be done, since stealth has counters

This is getting redundant… I’m just going to copy/past other people post at this point.

Gallrvaghn.4921:

Although these are effective means of mitigating a thief’s frontloaded attacks, they can still not be considered specific counters against stealth since I could also use these techniques against other classes that do not utilize stealth.

And pre-emptive usage of these actions if you are aware that a thief is nearby is still playing by the thief’s rules and relies mostly on luck or on the thief’s mistake or lack of experience. I would wait in the shadows if I am a thief until those defensive cooldowns expire and I can happily HS spam on you after a few backstab hits afterwards. Meanwhile, you swing your weapons aimlessly here and there hoping to see a downed thief pop somewhere.

What I want to see is more access to skills like Sic-em for other classes. Skills that limit the ability to stealth or the duration of stealth or reveal stealthed players in an area but at the cost of utilities with cooldowns and such just like how people bring stunbreaks for stuns and CC.

You seem to be believe stealth counters everything… Asking for all professions to have an anti-stealth mechanism is too direct not every profession handle CC or conditions that well the same should be for stealth.
Remember we don’t want to make stealth useless.

SharkKilL.6745:

I was trying condi-build one time, but find it too easy to play.
So yes, i know what i’m talking about, i didn’t have any trouble with 90% of players! (for one week that i was condi thief i met only one elem who can survive 1 vs 1, we was fighting about 15 min, and we understand that it’s gonna be forever and stop this fight)

90% of players don’t know how thief or stealth works. It’s all about pressure they panicked and messed up. P/D is not as easy as it seems I play it too sure it got advantages but some builds do hard counter it.

SharkKilL.6745:

Hello everyone!
Maybe it’s already was on this forum, but i’m want to say few words about condi thiefs.
They are just kittened me off…
After patch everyone who have cut hands can play for this one…
Realy, you don’t need any type of skill to play for this one and win 1 vs X.
For the last week i didn’t met any d/d or s/d thiefs, all thiefs (!) was p/d.
So i’m hope that ArenaNet will do something with that!

P.S. For d/d thiefs it’s not big problem, but I am in rage because now i’m trying to learn how to play for my other characters, but on WvW i’m met a lot of condi – thiefs (alone and (most funny) in groups) and can survive only few sec.

Oh 1vs X? I never realized I could take the whole team with P/D when did we get that buff?

This is going to lead to stealth again……

RedSpectrum.1975:

Aberrant.6749:

Ross Biddle.2367:

vincecontix.1264:

Thiefs are weak get over it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPbG1TCNxVY total noob warrior facerolling thiefs

So you post a vid of what’s considered the second most OP class in the game being wrecked by what’s considered the first most OP class in the game?

Facerolls a faceroll?

God I wish my comp was good enough to record. Eng also wrecks Teef all day long. Inb4 eng is faceroll.

^^^ engineers laugh at thieves so hard. Whether they be condition or even power, the amount of area control they put out can lock down most thief builds easy

I don’t have issues with most engineers they have weaker cleansing then me but one thing they all do is pop supply crate on me everytime. I don’t understand for warrior as well I usually stealth until the stance is over and it’s not hard to evade the burst skills.

If you play thief you would know it’s UP class forced to used either full SA or Acrobatics to survive don’t have it you do not last long enough to do your damage. You probably encounter the glass canon ones with wrong weapon set and traits I only make you my target if you use P/D or S/D. D/.. is just meh do what you want.

Why isn’t anyone talking about improving thief,make the trap and trick skills more useful,give them more survivability without having to use stealth,make other weapon useful in pvp because I’m pretty sure everyone knows P/P and S/P are useless in pvp D/D is weak without stealth.

Poplolita.2638:

Sagat.3285:

Poplolita.2638:

Sagat.3285:

Poplolita.2638:

Sagat.3285:

Poplolita.2638:

Xter.6271:

Thieves are not an issue, stealth is not an issue, the issue is people wanting an easy button. You people don’t complain about me stacking my boons through my own combo fields while I damage you and become more of a threat as the fight progresses. The simple solution is to just prevent what is causing the issues from happening and as the old saying goes. “The simplest solution is the best solution”.

Regards,
Xter

I will corrupt boon with some dark path here and there to death!

Yes because every style can be countered but not from all professions.

Ah so now there is a “but”. I was just my way to tell you your analogy doesn’t work. And it still don’t.

What do you mean? Corruption necro counter boon ele better than any other professions the same way good Turret/Rifle Engi counter stealth with CC. Certain professions and builds will do better or worse in some situations what’s wrong with that? Are you supposed to handle perfectly everything with any build on any class?

It’s a hardcounter, what you were describing with stealth were soft counters. Soft counters =/= hardcounters

Thief is soft already want to know hard counters having to go in SA and/or Acrobatics,having useless pvp weapon set P/P,S/P, rely on burst condi or crit if we try to make it a long fight we lose, no thief survives without having some kind of stealth other than S/D users who still have SR, more people in battle the lesser you matter unless you use stealth….
So let’s see what are my options to play maybe try popular S/D build mmm it seem hambow famous to me nah I’ll go P/D just for fun since D/… doesn’t work for me because I die too fast without stealth….
It’s so great having so much options isn’t it?!!!

Poplolita.2638:

Obviously, making any significant nerf to stealth would have to come with some significant buffs. Maybe make some trait not so kitten dependant to stealth might be a good start. Almost their whole trait line rely on it… surviviability wise.

;)

Would like to let go of stealth for a while but nothing is here yet so I will be using it to the max till something can replace it. Let’s see how the devs handle this request. I only use condition builds in pvp.

Poplolita.2638:

Sagat.3285:

Poplolita.2638:

Sagat.3285:

Poplolita.2638:

Xter.6271:

Thieves are not an issue, stealth is not an issue, the issue is people wanting an easy button. You people don’t complain about me stacking my boons through my own combo fields while I damage you and become more of a threat as the fight progresses. The simple solution is to just prevent what is causing the issues from happening and as the old saying goes. “The simplest solution is the best solution”.

Regards,
Xter

I will corrupt boon with some dark path here and there to death!

Yes because every style can be countered but not from all professions.

Ah so now there is a “but”. I was just my way to tell you your analogy doesn’t work. And it still don’t.

What do you mean? Corruption necro counter boon ele better than any other professions the same way good Turret/Rifle Engi counter stealth with CC. Certain professions and builds will do better or worse in some situations what’s wrong with that? Are you supposed to handle perfectly everything with any build on any class?

It’s a hardcounter, what you were describing with stealth were soft counters. Soft counters =/= hardcounters

Thief is soft already want to know hard counters having to go in SA and/or Acrobatics,having useless pvp weapon set P/P,S/P, rely on burst condi or crit if we try to make it a long fight we lose, no thief survives without having some kind of stealth other than S/D users who still have SR, more people in battle the lesser you matter unless you use stealth….
So let’s see what are my options to play maybe try popular S/D build mmm it seem hambow famous to me nah I’ll go P/D just for fun since D/… doesn’t work for me because I die too fast without stealth….
It’s so great having so much options isn’t it?!!!

Poplolita.2638:

Sagat.3285:

Poplolita.2638:

Xter.6271:

Thieves are not an issue, stealth is not an issue, the issue is people wanting an easy button. You people don’t complain about me stacking my boons through my own combo fields while I damage you and become more of a threat as the fight progresses. The simple solution is to just prevent what is causing the issues from happening and as the old saying goes. “The simplest solution is the best solution”.

Regards,
Xter

I will corrupt boon with some dark path here and there to death!

Yes because every style can be countered but not from all professions.

Ah so now there is a “but”. I was just my way to tell you your analogy doesn’t work. And it still don’t.

What do you mean? Corruption necro counter boon ele better than any other professions the same way good Turret/Rifle Engi counter stealth with CC. Certain professions and builds will do better or worse in some situations what’s wrong with that? Are you supposed to handle perfectly everything with any build on any class?

Poplolita.2638:

Xter.6271:

Thieves are not an issue, stealth is not an issue, the issue is people wanting an easy button. You people don’t complain about me stacking my boons through my own combo fields while I damage you and become more of a threat as the fight progresses. The simple solution is to just prevent what is causing the issues from happening and as the old saying goes. “The simplest solution is the best solution”.

Regards,
Xter

I will corrupt boon with some dark path here and there to death!

Yes because every style can be countered but not from all professions.

godz raiden.2631:

kishter.9578:

Thief abuses Stealth to the point that it becomes obvious that without stealth, they do not know how to play.
Perhaps it is time that the Thief players L2P without depending on Stealth too much.

If you think a thief that knows how to use stealth properly is tough to fight, just wait until you fight a good S/D thief. If Anet ever does give in to players like you who want stealth nerfed into the ground, then you’re going to regret forcing good thief players to go S/D build routes instead. It’s going to be more of us destroying you, just instead of avoiding your attacks in stealth, we’ll do it all right in front of your face and make you feel even more helpless.

S/D is not as great as the community and users claim it is still heavy initiative costing depending on who you are fighting. Stealth gets team pressure of you in team battles since they can’t see you as soon as I see S/D thief you’re my first target if you can stealth like me let the struggle begin.
I feel like everyone posting on this thread or any stealth related ones forgot that thief is supposed to easily engage and disengage. The best of doing it you ask? = stealth. If you feel like stealth gets rewarded too much that’s why it’s almost a base mechanism since I don’t think that high of Steal unless they make it more interesting.
The only close to reliable way to disengage is SB but no weapon should be enforced for the class to work properly. There is no solution to stealth it’s almost the same as adrenaline or death pool. It’s the class role based on the game not me.

ShakeyStorm.7180:

Correction anti-stealth. And I am not for removing or providing a “one button” counter for stealth. Just toning it down a bit.

Just so happens thief abuses Stealth to the point that it becomes obvious that without stealth, they do not know how to play.

Warriors have been in worse situations but we try different builds. Even the most laughable ones sometimes results in something good.

Perhaps it is time that the Thief players L2P without depending on Stealth too much.

Thief abuses stealth or evade because any thief is glassy without SA or Acrobatics. Any thief without those trait lines is bound to get shredded by almost any build. It’s like the game forces us to use one or both of them no other class is like that. That is THE PROBLEM with thief.

I play condi thief and if you don’t know I have the weakest cleansing in game. If I can handle terromancer and condi engi there is no way any other class should struggle against conditions builds unless it counters your build for example boon engi vs corruption necro or glass canon.
Solution get cleansing, a little more vitality,don’t let conditions surprise you as one my self I have timing to create a certain burst, do not stay in red circles.
The only conditions strong with power build are burning and fear. D/D ele can only reach that if he’s hybrid with 20+ might stacks.

Cygnus.6903:

MidoriMarch.8067:

any class/mechanics can be “OP” if the player is extremely good and skillful

You’re not using “OP” correctly.

Anyway, I disagree with you. Stealth in itself is an OP mechanic in the right hands. There is no mechanic in this entire game that even comes close to how powerful stealth can be. Which is why I was talking about good players. Because in the hands of bads, stealth is, unsurprisingly, bad.

On topic; stealth is not something you can fix IMO. That would mean to remove the easy access to it that both thief and mesmer have, which in turn means you would have to seriously buff them both. So if you are serious about fixing stealth, try buffing thief and mesmer first. Then mostly remove stealth, and voila.

@Shakeystorm; you can’t expect a ‘fix stealth’ topic to not have any discussion on the class that uses stealth most.

Every thing should be OP in the right hands that means you understand the concept and use it to full capacity. I keep saying this but If I choose to go in tank trait line I better get some way to survive if not something is broken.

People the trait line is to buff stealth not the other way around if I waste my skill points for tankiness I should have some tankiness LOGIC. If you never played thief then you have never experienced the struggle of a natural glass class.

Everyone is taking this the wrong way. You are talking about nerfing SA and it’s purpose to BUFF STEALTH not the other way around.
Since it seems that everyone here seem to have experience fighting thief using stealth not necessarily using SA, how long do they last out of stealth or how do they tank your burst or condi?
I’m surprised that no one talks about enhancing Trap and Trick skills or maybe making S/P or P/P more viable in pvp. That is where the unbalance in thief comes from when a certain build is WAY more popular than other one. Solution fix the UP then the true OP will show itself.
If someone chooses to go SA the tank trait line he should be able to tank it’s common sense. Any thief out there successfully hiting backstabe on D/D I have respect for you it is not easy, D/P uses so much initiative I don’t know where is the dmg coming from.
Think people think.

Sneaky Turban.6823:

Ghostwolf.9863:

1. Thief would need a huge overhaul if stealth was touched. That 1 second is a matter of life and death in many situations for a stealth spamming thief, it also would desynch the rotation in PvE and lower dps. During those weeks they actually put it to 4s, the only remaining viable stealth builds were P/D and D/P.
2. Sword auto-attack damage is strong as it is, and increasing it would only make it more powerful where it already is powerful, while it still would be meaningless where it is meaningless. Thieves would still get roflstomped by zergs or groups if they try to go auto-cleave inside it.
3. I see no reason to tone this one down, and it would give thieves less reason to not pick sleight of hand.
4. Thieves have to be treated seperately compared to other classes when it comes to chill. First off they aren’t able to swap weaponsets, kits or attunements in order to gain 5 fresh cooldowns, secondly initiative governs the use of every weaponskill.
From my experience, chill is already a hard counter to thieves not having access to Withdraw the moment they get chilled.

The reason behind most of the thief changes is to get more condi and Shadow arts thieves to run trickery, reason being stealth is abused in this game especially when it comes to d/p and also dagger offhand using cloak and dagger on ambients.

1. As for the 4s reveal it seems the best way to tone down the use of stealth, having that 1s extra out of stealth can be very dangerous and is proven in PvP.
2. Again sword attack damage increase is just to bait people into changing to trickery builds which have a much higher skill cap than SA.
3. This trait could be reasonable if it were not for perplexity, giving thieves 10 stacks of confusion is just stupid especially if they are running p/p headshot spam, although I did try to nerf perplexity a bit giving it -20% confusion duration.
4. You bring up a very good point, thieves aren’t able to swap weapons and have a new fresh set of cd’s, but I still believe initiative needs to be damaged by chill even if it were to be something such as 33% instead of the normal 66%.

Whoah that’s very selfish of you.
First of all you are not to decide what trait line should be enforced just because you think it’s better. Second stealth and SA are no where broken as they are the only form of defense outside of people who don’t to evade and use Acrobatics. If you don’t like it because you don’t use it your claim is not valid.
Counters to stealth:
-block
-blind and blind fields
-dodging CnD
-all control(range,melee,condition..)
-Warrior
-zerg
-tanks
Third have you played the old condi thief 0/0/6/2/2? They used to rely on bleed spam and might stacking from dodge and stealth it was very passive nerfing the confusion is wrong as it forces the thief to be more aggressive.
Initiative is fine as it is making the class more reliant on advanced skill is wrong and simply represent your disappointment when seeing a noob one. Thief is the favorite glass canon don’t know who started that popularity…
People stop panicking against stealth.

Bombsaway.7198:

The issue of condition damage is really more “overload” than anything else.
Conditions are number of conditions applied x damage vs number of conditions you can remove in a certain amount of time to avoid that damage.

Overload comes when the conditions you remove do not adequately remove damage because you removed a “cover” or “lesser priority” condition.

SOLUTION: If possible given coding, allow players to have a panel which they can set that ranks each condition in terms of removal priority. You could choose to remove torment over confusion or burning over bleeding. Of course, you wouldn’t necessarily know what characters you would face in a fight. Likewise, it wouldn’t give you more condition removal just more control over what is removed.

The system would ONLY work in WvW and PvP because you simply don’t know what to predict. In PvE (which I do little of), it may be broken because you would just reset your priorities to remove the big condition of a mob which you would know ahead of time what it is. That assumes PvE has “cover conditions” which I am not sure of the fights to know one way or another.

You would need to ensure that you couldn’t reset the priorities easily keep by keep or fight by fight (which could help make it fair I suppose for PvE too). You may have to go back to a trainer (even if it is free) in your main city to reset etc etc.

I will support this when they allow me to choose which boon to steal or burn.

Zardul.3952:

there is no let down to conditions other than condi cleanse traits.

power builds have Toughness, vitality, healing, defence, dodge, dmg reduction skills, traits, chill, cripple, stun etc e tc etc etc

there is soo much down sides to power builds, condi is like running GOD mode.

why would you try to instantly kill someone who can do all of the above and just laugh at you and watch you run around like a headless chicken taking dmg from auto application stacks.

its laughable.

even Thiefs can apply condis .. stealth.. apply condis.. stealth.. its a joke how powerful condis are. you can even afk on them

If you take this from a different point of view.. You know what you are getting when using zerker gear for a conditioner to beat you he or she needs to disable you or protect themselves from your damage.
You choose to protect your self or not with traits or utilities. In the end it’s all about who put more pressure to panick other so he or she messes up. In other words if rather than dps or burst the foe down while evading the more dangerous conditions you start running or become passive he wins.
I play condi thief you shouldn’t be worried about them or stealth. It’s all about exploiting the other classes weaknesses and if you can’t protect your self from conditions I will be more than happy to exploit that.

Carighan.6758:

Zardul.3952:

No1 in this forum is taking into account Toughness .. power builds or zerkers do 50% less dmg to the majority of condi gear because of TOUGHNESS

Condi gear.. relys on Condi clease from Traits or skills.

Condi will forever be OP there is no Dmg reduction for it.

That is a compounding problem.
Everyone, if they have a free item slot, gets Toughness. Why? Because otherwise Thieves and Warriors and just about everyone can kill you with direct damage in two hits.

Only… against conditions, you’d want Vitality and Healing Power, either or a mix. It’s not that there’s no defensive stat, it’s that the pure power of direct damage forces everyone to build against it, whether they’d like to or not.

Then stop thinking more HP or recovery will outdo conditions you need cleansing. If I as a thief can do it others classes should be fine.

For people that keep thinking that conditions are too strong I shall not believe you unless you main thief because if I can survive using so predictable CnD against AoE condi engi no other classes should complain.
And if you didn’t realize power build become more offensive if they go crit that why zerker is so popular :kill it before it kills you. Can conditions crit do the conditions weapons scale high with power???
Think people think.

SonOfKrypton.4357:

Tim.6450:

Indeed, warrior and guardian are not popular I take it?

The only classes I can think of without a viable condition build are Elementalists and Guardians.

Ele
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d23RjJYVaHw

Guardian feels a little akward but it is possible you’ll see a few of us in WWW or pvp. I use this build until I find a better one.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNArdRlsApZo97wbI8DNR8Ql1YUdAkAP61zwOcDA-TJRHwAV2fowpAAZZAAPBAA

Pointless discussion no class is going to be remade. Not everyone uses initiative gain builds or stealth some just don’t like it. If you have never played thief you wouldn’t understand how glassy this class is sure fighting a good one can be stressful but the overall tankiness is the weakest in the game.
Like somebody mention before p/d condi and s/d crit are the most popular thief build because they provide replacement for tanking mainly stealth and/or evade. Using initiative to cleanse,heal or evade means you are not attacking justifying the concept of high burst on thief condi or crit. There is a reason why p/p never works even with high damage.

Brando.1374:

Sagat.3285:

Brando.1374:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/balance/The-Highest-Theoretical-Burst/first#post4093244

when classes can burst like this, condition damage is just laughable since we wont be given the time to let out conditions tick.

Unless I don’t see you coming there is no way I will die quick. A lot of people run glass canon it does not end well for them there are many counters such as ranged burst,conditions,tanks,stealth,blind and so on…. Will you survive to execute your next move I don’t think so.

a good glass cannon will pick and choose when and who to engage. (makes sure you cant dodge/block/etc…)
a bad glass cannon will die because of the above items you mentioned.

Not every class can freely engage and disengage there will always be a risk even for a thief only few good ones steal kills and abuse of chaos.
Not the way I would play but I guess everyone is unique.

Brando.1374:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/balance/The-Highest-Theoretical-Burst/first#post4093244

when classes can burst like this, condition damage is just laughable since we wont be given the time to let out conditions tick.

Unless I don’t see you coming there is no way I will die quick. A lot of people run glass canon it does not end well for them there are many counters such as ranged burst,conditions,tanks,stealth,blind and so on…. Will you survive to execute your next move I don’t think so.

Carighan.6758:

Catharsis.8571:

I’m proposing balancing control conditions to not benefit from +condition duration, as high condition duration stat both increases a condi build’s control and damage

But then you run into class design issues. For example for Mesmers, the spec lined giving +duration is based on binary effects, not damaging conditions.

How would you handle that? Resort it so the duration effect is always on the condition damage line?

Also, there’s the compound issue that PvP is already a direct-damage game. Conditions only “dominate” at low-levels of play: casual sPvP and solo roaming WvW.

I’d say it depends if you are passive or not and your jewel. The build I use on my condition guardian counter dps builds allowing me to be more aggresive and a rabid war is pretty common in PvP.

You seem to forget that not all conditions are used by conditions build. If you prevent control condition to be affected by conditions duration power and crit build can be affected as well because some do use those conditions to their advantage especially weakness and vulnerability.

Condition is not meta in pvp but I do love seeing people who think they’re good enough for no cleansing or just don’t know about them. In pve removing the cap for intensity stacking conditions would improve gameplay but duration stacking ones are a bit tricky since the highest burn is form guardian, highest poison from ranger and fear only does damage on necro other ones would be useless.

Why not improve conditions especially in pve? A lot and I mean a lot of people roam or zerg with poor to none cleansing and have the idea :“My pure damage will kill you before your conditions kill me.” Please don’t complain if you’re are that type of quick killer.
Conditions builds existed,exist and will continue to exist even if they are only a few of us left.

Hammerguard.9834:

Oh, you wanted condi damage to do nothing to you? That makes sense. We have to be able to remove 100% condi damage or it’s broken.

Plz fiks, AyNet.

You my friend have the most reasonable,simple and real comment here. Give this man a cookie.

SilkySmooth.1574:

Bash.7291:

SilkySmooth.1574:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNAS7dlsApcoVDxZI8DNR8QZVHUdAkAP61zwPkDA-TpgMgAA7PIXGAA

drop the carrion, its not good for a guard.

celestial is the key for any hybrid build. i burn for 670, much lower yes. but my crit dmg is 200% and 30% crit chance. also my armor is 2.8k so im super tanky.
you really dont need any more burn uptime then this. let me list ur burns:

burn every 5th hit (virtue of justice)
virtue of justice active 2x
burn on block( 5x aegis, focus 5, shelter)
judge’s intervention
purging flames
shimmering defense

if you didnt kill ur enemy by now, its a bunker:D

i have 3200 tourneys on my guard and 80% of it is dps. most of the builds listed up here arent viable for tournaments, maby just for fun in hotjoins. sustain is key in winning with a (semi) burn build

/sigh… No GS, shimmering defense, low power, low condition damage… yeah…. gonna pass on that.

my build is based on high end solo/teamQ matches, not random hotjoin. its not all stats which matter.

no gs? personal choise. hammer is for me the best weapon in any ranked match.

shimmering defense, whats the problem with that? free 12 sec burn

low power, i bet i hit much more then all of ur carrion builds, you got no crits at all and if you crit, its low. my sigil of intell will make me always land my spike with hammer.

low condi dmg.. ur (only) condi is burn. 835 with 1200 condi dmg, 672 with 700 condi dmg. This might seem like a big difference? 1 tick 160, 10 ticks 1600, 20 ticks 3200. my crits will do much more dmg then the 160 extra per tick. amplified wrath is the main reason why we guards dont need a high condi dmg at all.

i have played every (yes every) posible dps build for guardians, in both soloQ and teamQ. the main thing you need to be viable is sustain. `
carrion amulet is made for necro’s which got like tripple our HP. or warriors with all their stances.

Lucentfir.7430:

If you’re going to make a burn power condi spec, you’re better off with Carrion than celestial. The vitality from Carrion will fill the void of not putting any points in honor, and by going 6 in valor you get sustain and toughness. Carrion based builds I can do about 800 ticks on burn while having over 2k power(I run Flame legion Runes). Not to mention my damage ramps up for every block with might of the defender, and stack burns easy with Defender’s flame. Very low crit but respectable damage amps from burning foes=17%(22% if you decide to take Zealous blade).

GS because GS 5 scales off Condi damage, and Symbol of Wrath has retal(scales on power). Celestial isn’t really good on guard tbh unless you have selfless daring, more conditions other than burning. Other professions like Ele, Engi, and Warrior can makes the best use of of it because there are some builds that use every stat effectively.

Bunkers die when you put doom sigil and geomancy(my preference) to work in tandem with your burning.

with celestial i also dont need honor nor vitality.
ur 2000 power is useless whitout crits. a crit does 200% more dmg, ur raw dps isnt even close to double the celestial dps.

I’m not complaining about your build but you can keep denying the very point of this post it is not about finding a utility purpose for burning but to create the condition guardian.
I do admit that the builds above haven’t worked out better than my boon one other than yours wich I haven’t tried. I have no terrible issue with my current build I do survive,maitain burning and poison,some retaliation,cleansing and even the regen part. My issue is that all our advantages are not included in the build while others can.

Since I haven’t saw a build that’s worth changing mine I’ll stick to the boon gaining one.
Valor seem to be they way to go since Amplified Wrath is not in Radiance.

Bash.7291:

Aza.2105:

Bash.7291:

Aza.2105:

Bash.7291:

As far as the off topic build discussions, I have to really disagree with the thought that radiance is the way to go over valor. Considering that radiant retaliation is not that much of an improvement on damage over regular power based retaliation, and that most, if not all builds already use carrion amulet, the damage difference is not worth the massive trade off in survivability that you get from valor.

Depends.

Do you consider the 33% retaliation dmg reduction significant? Most guardian players will not go full zeal in a power build. So with a amulet with power as the main stat, retaliation does 238 dmg per hit.

With radiant retaliation and 1500 condition dmg it does 289 damage per hit. It doesn’t seem like a lot but when consider fast hitting skills then the difference adds up. So in just two attacks you end up hitting for 100 more dmg and that continues to scale upward the more the target hits you.

With radiant retaliation it increases retaliation damage by around 21%. So the ret pvp nerf is signicantly decreased. For a power user they will feel the 33% nerf, for a condition user with the radiant ret its around 11-12% nerf. Is that a big difference to you? I guess it depends how one looks at it.

If you are going to compare a power build to a condi build for this, you also need to include the amount of retaliation uptime, which power builds are going to have much more of due to being able to trait into virtues for the extra sources/duration.

In all honesty, as far as i can tell with what you have posted (6/6/2/0/0) for what your spec is, you actually have very little retaliation uptime. I am going based off the assumption that you only have signet of judgement, leap finisher with GS, and possibly Stand your ground as your only sources. Meanwhile any power build that traits 3 into virtues will have much better up time, and thus end up dealing more damage.

What is stopping one from going 6 into radiance and 3 into virtues?

I was going off of your 6/6/2/0/0 that you listed yourself. There is nothing to stop that, except you are gimping your burning damage by doing so.

If possible share this build because I cannot make my way around it. It seems pointless.

Signets are terrible I will forget ever using them.

SilkySmooth.1574:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNAS7dlsApcoVDxZI8DNR8QZVHUdAkAP61zwPkDA-TpgMgAA7PIXGAA

drop the carrion, its not good for a guard.

celestial is the key for any hybrid build. i burn for 670, much lower yes. but my crit dmg is 200% and 30% crit chance. also my armor is 2.8k so im super tanky.
you really dont need any more burn uptime then this. let me list ur burns:

burn every 5th hit (virtue of justice)
virtue of justice active 2x
burn on block( 5x aegis, focus 5, shelter)
judge’s intervention
purging flames
shimmering defense

if you didnt kill ur enemy by now, its a bunker:D

i have 3200 tourneys on my guard and 80% of it is dps. most of the builds listed up here arent viable for tournaments, maby just for fun in hotjoins. sustain is key in winning with a (semi) burn build

That the issue tough this post isn’t about semi burn…
I used Carrion on my previous condition builds it worked given the fact that Rabit doesn’t give me enough vitality on guardian unless I use Force of Will.
Sure some builds counter conditions but those conditions builds should at least be reliable in general. I’m open to suggestions since I tried many builds but like I said they were all missing something.

Since most are giving opinions I’ll try this in the meantime
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQNAR7dl0ApSoNCxZI8DNx9Ql5VEiWuBfQ1DQAMoA-TJRHAB3eRAqY/BkKDAwTAAA
I can’t do without some kind of regen on me but this should be decent.

Aza.2105:

Sagat.3285:

Alright let’s do this not every build is perfect but ever since I stop using Supreme Justice burn on block become my main source of burn even tough I don’t use every possible block. I agree with doom sigil but geomency or hydromancy is not guaranteed to hit.
The problem is all the necessary traits are scattered. Permeating Wrath,Supreme Justie,Fiery Wrath,Searing Flames,Defender’s Flame,Might of the Protector,Amplified Wrath. I can’t do a proper condition build on guardian without missing an advantage. I have been pvping with differents builds and even tough it worked out there was always a struggling part wheter it was Meditation,Signets,Consecrations or my most recent one boon gaining.

I can’t say I agree, the way I view Permeating Wrath and Supreme Justice now is that they exist to turn any weapon guardian wields into a condi weapon. If you use torch as a off hand there really is no need for those two traits.

I can definitely see my self using both in pve but who came up with Permeating Wrath more importantly that it burns around you and not around the target? It’s not like we have a real ranged weapon because Tome of Wrath is not reliable.
Torch has it’s lows using Scepter/Focus and GS have been my best weapon set for condition so far unless we do actually get a bow with decent skills.
Overall semi or fully reliable damage if we don’t take in consideration burn duration are conditions from sigil,might from block and swap or full radiance but it is even close to other condition builds? My condition thief can kill faster and maintain higher health in the end.
We need improvements.

Bezagron.7352:

For my condition guardian I’ve been using the below signet build (6,6,2,0,0) which I’ve been finding very effective. Weapons of choice are sw/t & sc/f.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fVAQRAsf7dl0ApSoFCxRI8DNR9QZ9F8BTQ1HQAcoXNDA-TJRHwAp3fIwJBAZZAAPBAA

I feel many people when thinking about condition build only think about the damaging conditions. And this is were the Guardian lacks as without sigils & runes Guardian’s only have burning. The latest runes & sigils change has helped greatly in this.

As can been seen I’ve taken the on weapon swap doom & geomancy. I find I have more control over condition application with the on swaps and with bleed, burn & poison with no might stack your doing 1485 condi dmg per tick.

But damage condition are not only what your bringing. You have blinds, immobilise, vulnerable & weakness. The sweat deal with this build is any blind or immobilise will also apply vulnerable. This give you 3 almost on demand covering conditions (blind, immob & vul I would not use the weakness) for your damaging conditions.

Why signets, because with this build you get benefits for both the passive & the active;
(Comments about signets are related to the above build)

• Signet of Wrath (24sec cooldown) – passive 180 extra condi dmg with the 3 condition is any extra 105 dmg per tick but this is and extra bonus, you take it for the active. Immobilise 4sec & 5 stacks of vul for 11sec.
• Bane Signet (32sec cooldown) – passive 180 extra power talks for itself but again the active almost a AA attack in dmg plus 2 sec knockdown. Yes the 3/4 cast time can be frustrating which can limit which skills can be interrupted but channeled, stomps, ress & most heals (around 1sec cast) can be interrupted. It takes practice witht he timing.
• Signet of Judgment (24sec cooldown) – This one is mainly for the passive which reduces dmg by 10%. Now this is calculated after the armour reduction. I have checked numbers but with only 2219 armour this makes it feel like you have at least 2600 if not a little more. The active is just the icing on the cake with a 24sec stun break causing weakness and granting retal.

Condition control is by active play with offensive pressure, positioning, blinds, blocks with SoR & purity (remove 2 every 10sec) to catch any that get through.

I find I stick to 6,6,?,?,? with the 2 point able to be place where you like. Even the choice of trait’s in zeal and radiance can be adjusted. Dropping 2 into Virtues taking trait VI and purging flames losing SoW or Bane gives more condi removal and and aoe burn almost the size of a capture point for 6 sec. Likewise 2 in Honor with trait II taking SYG gives keeping RoJ give 1 soucre of stability & retal plus 2 stun breaks.

But on a whole I’ve found the above build works for my playstyle. Lastly of note is the 25% movement speed increase. This allows for easier kiting & sticking to targets. Either Travellers or Speed work.

Edit: added comment about runes

Alright let’s do this not every build is perfect but ever since I stop using Supreme Justice burn on block become my main source of burn even tough I don’t use every possible block. I agree with doom sigil but geomency or hydromancy is not guaranteed to hit.
The problem is all the necessary traits are scattered. Permeating Wrath,Supreme Justie,Fiery Wrath,Searing Flames,Defender’s Flame,Might of the Protector,Amplified Wrath. I can’t do a proper condition build on guardian without missing an advantage. I have been pvping with differents builds and even tough it worked out there was always a struggling part wheter it was Meditation,Signets,Consecrations or my most recent one boon gaining.