Guild Wars 2

amusingly I browsed through one today and it had amusing things in it like elementalists should stay away from the dagger setups in pvp, and other great gems.

also the stat tables were quite amusing stating naked stats and obviously with gear on.

edit; i am too tired for this, sorry for overuse of ‘amusing’, etc. Ugh…

Grebcol.5984:

As a thief myself i must say yes. Its also really boring(and easy) to play, so i changed back to power.

can play p/d power. but yes I agree, it is boring.

cyyrix.6105:

Maugetarr.6823:

cyyrix.6105:

Maugetarr.6823:

cyyrix.6105:

Maugetarr.6823:

Considering he used a 30 second CD, the tradeoff seems fair. Actually if you hadn’t used your sword skill and dodged instead after the sigil gave you the endurance back, you would have revealed the thief when the backstab hit your clone and been able to burst him down using IL, swap, blurred frenzy, and mind wrack.

Waste more CDs trying to burst down a thief that just used consume plasma? Good joke.

The thief’s 30s CD heal isn’t what baited my CDs. It was the threat of a high damage skill being spammed four consecutive times. The thief can spam four backstabs way more than every 30s. Calling that a fair tradeoff is absurd.

Backstab’s spammy mechanic encourages unskillful play. Making it cost initiative (and then maybe increase the damage to compensate) would be a major improvement.

Well, in the current meta, a fair number of mesmers take shattered concentration, so most of the boons remaining would have been ripped (if you had that as well). You also had mantra of distraction, so whether he was D/P or D/D, you had the skills on your bar to stop him from stealthing. Even if he had dropped shadow refuge, you had illusionary wave off cooldown. You had means available to counter all of his stealthing attempts, save blinding powder.

You’re really missing the point here. I’m not complaining about killing thieves. I’m not asking for a nerf. I’m certainly not looking for advice on how to play mesmer.

I’m suggesting a rework that would make good thieves better (higher damage from backstab) in exchange for making bad thieves worse (wasted initiative spamming backstab on blinds/aegis/evades). It would encourage skillful play for everyone.

I think you’re missing my point. There is already a lot of counterplay to prevent the thief from getting into stealth. Once he’s in stealth, you have to survive 3(4) seconds due to your failure to counterplay. You are asking for a nerf.

Here’s a little more talk about your idea though. Adding more damage to it as compensation would make it a more overwhelming skill than most people except those who are used to PvP can handle. BS is already a 6.5-8k hit in sPvP and 8-11k in WvW depending on your (or rather both players’) build(s). They nerfed mug’s damage because people couldn’t handle that output (subjectively). Right now, BS is a 2.4 multiplier from the back, and 1.2 from the front. Upping it to 2.6 or 2.7 would cause more complaints, regardless of the fact that it would cost initiative.

Yes. Failure to prevent stealth should be punishing. That doesn’t mean you should support unskilled, spammy mechanics like backstab. You can always compensate for the change. For example, if each backstab attempt costs 2 initiative:

1) Increased backstab damage (you don’t like this one)
2) Gain some combination of boons when you land backstab
3) Gain 4 initiative when you land backstab
4) Strip boons when you land backstab

All of these things would be a nice buff for the talented thief that lands backstab, while punishing untalented thieves that spam backstab on blinds/aegis/evades. This is a nerf to bad thieves and a buff to good ones. It’s unfortunate that you can’t grasp that.

1) people would cry more, resulting in a net power loss over a 2 year period.
2) unless it’s 5s stab, 5s prot, or something overpowered, it wouldn’t be a decent trade off, in my opinion. adding the buffs we lack (any but fleeting regen, but I am looking at you stability and protection) (not including daggerstorm or the crappy grandmaster trait they added no one ever used ever except once.) doesn’t seem to be anything that’s going to happen without a rework to our class altogether.
3)this is just overpowered in my opinion and would make initiative when fighting a good thief almost useless to them because they will never be down more than 1-4 ini other than immediately after a skill use.
4)we already strip the second most boons in the game, iirc. in fact we had our boon stripping nerfed on sword already.

Overall in my opinion everything you are suggesting is a waste of everyone’s time. You need to learn how to deal with thieves. Good ones are good ones. Some people play better than others. I die a lot, and I am a thief. Don’t make me use the words.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

• What is the first thing that comes to mind when you’re about to face a Mesmer?

I wonder if it is condition or power, then secondarily, PU.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

• How do you feel about your odds of winning?

I feel generally very good, though sometimes I just faceplant for them. I mean just one shot from the first frenzy combo etc lol. When we are both on our game I really enjoy the fights as I am certainly not great.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

• Strategies and tactics?

Keep gaps closed, don’t waste my step, don’t miss my steal, and stay invisible longer than them, if applicable. As mainly a DD player it’s not that hard, but pu… I normally walk away, because it’s boring, kinda like our 6shadow arts builds (mostly).

Chaos Archangel.5071:

• Which type of Thief build do you feel best fights Mesmer?

Any the thief is comfortable with, if he has encountered and learned how to fight a mesmer before. It’s possible to condibomb as a thief, kinda, but will generally end the fight faster than a condition thief.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

• What Thief skills (weapon or utility) are most important to have in this fight?

As above, any the thief is comfortable with. Just like you guys (power scepter? wtf? oh crap they are good (blocked my daggerstorm reflected AA3 chain lol… well played)).

Chaos Archangel.5071:

• How do you feel about Mesmer in general?

I enjoy them and need to learn more about them. I have tried playing my 80 recently, but I dislike your condition builds, and I have a lot to learn about the tiny nuances involved with multiple power shatter weapons/build combinations. I normally just log my thief though.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Along with anything else you’d like to add. My plan is to make a thread in the Mes forums detailing and explaining how fighting us feels for other classes, and hopefully learn some things along the way. Thanks in advance for any assistance!

As a new player it was confusing watching you guys disappear (even as a thief main, after a mesmer being my first character to 36 and then deleting). Once I learned the fairly obvious real mesmer it became a cinch, then it was just refining how to kill you guys. Lockdown, and the ones I don’t notice give me the most problems. If I know you are around though I am normally not concerned.

Personally I hate running into your condition specs (but I slot very little removal most time and I accept that). But if I had to choose a weapon, it would be sword/x(probably focus if I had to choose an offhand), and staff. The amount of juking and invuln frames available with your class mechanics and weaponset is just on par with us

Hope this was beneficial.

Even with power, the immob is rocking, especially in Panic Strike builds.

babazhook.6805:

It simply illogical to dismiss the heal because “it not noticeable unless supplemented with other sources”.

No, not when he is asking for a particular build where the only other supplements available to it are food, mug, and signet of malice. Those alone with probably one of the glassier builds available to thief are not enough to play more offensively to take benefit of it and it be valuable over other options in Critical Strikes.

In general though, I agree with you, and it is workable. I still wouldn’t call it amazing or anything.

Believe it prioritizes stab and prot, not sure after that. could be mistaken.

Odyssey.2613:

Tried the IP, AR, and Malice. Got my butt kicked several times. Not enough healing outside of spamming away in the middle of a zerg.

Good to hear, kinda… I will just keep it for pve hehe.

I was afraid to put on AR, SoM, and IP and try. I just feel so wet noodled without one or the other gm traits (when I go down that line).

the sustain it adds to 26006 isn’t enough by itself to warrant dropping HK or Exe in my opinion, even buffed.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Selver.1307:

4/6/0/0/4

sundering strikes, pistol mastery, ricochet, combined training, executioner or ip

signet of agility
assassin’s signet
open(probably RfI, for burst ini stunbreak, inf signet for sustained ini stunbreak)

keeps good in damage, can string decent amount of unloads.

in events you can circle mobs as best you can spamming and it tags most things. The cleave isn’t reliable but it isn’t terrible. I use it for open world when I am lazy.

Pistol Mastery is a waste trait. You can get the 10% from 5pt into DA since your target will always have condition anyway. Since you already put 4pts into DA, why would you waste 4 pts into CS just to get Pistol Mastery?

Building around spamming Unload is not as profitable than you might think.

Notice this is written with PvE in mind, open world PvE mind you…

It’s not exactly rocket science and I mentioned it’s for being lazy.
edit: CS line for Invigorating Precision, assistance in sustain, pistol mastery on the way.

fan boy? really? because I find someone not able to read their tooltips amusing?

lol. I noticed this the day I got the game.

I should have quoted the previous users who mentioned it as well, so as to not single out my love for Sir Vincent.

4/6/0/0/4

sundering strikes, pistol mastery, ricochet, combined training, executioner or ip

signet of agility
assassin’s signet
open(probably RfI, for burst ini stunbreak, inf signet for sustained ini stunbreak)

keeps good in damage, can string decent amount of unloads.

in events you can circle mobs as best you can spamming and it tags most things. The cleave isn’t reliable but it isn’t terrible. I use it for open world when I am lazy.

hi I am a backstab victim.

I have read this thread and I refute it with a lack of adaptation, logic, or even trying.

Thank you,
-scrubs everywhere.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Nope. It’s in the game. You can read it in the tooltip.

The last line says;
“CTRL + Mouse 2: Enable (Disable) auto-attack”

top kek

/15chars

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Who uses Blinding Powder? — I surely don’t. I use D/D, D/P, S/D and P/P and I don’t see value in taking Blinding Powder.

Start from who ever uses this and see if this change has any significant effect.

I don’t see any advantage on using this. If you do use this, please let us know how this is affect you and your build.

I’m curious to know what made ArenaNet think this is even important.

It is trivial I agree but this does make it usable to stomp while channeling. It also … Yeah that’s probably the only good part about it. Go buffs?

Jump into the mists on each trying out the weapons. Damage/Survivability is a combo of skill gear and traits, but the weapons are going to define how you do it.

Level 1 I think offers the mists(crossed swords top corner menu).
If not it will be level 2 when you finish the ‘tutorial’.

I’d love it to eventually be one for every traitline per class.

Maybe like DA- rifle, though my vision is probably not your vision. I was thinking it more like an smg and all ad opposed to the benelli or Barrett.

CS- offhand sword duelist style.
SA- offhand torch or offhand scepter (more denial magic)
Acro- staff, donatello!
Trickery- axe in some fashion. Kinda lost. Felt similar with SA.

At least you understand it’s an emotional rant. Most complaining don’t. If they do they never come back to admit it.

Berserker gear is the thing in pve.
Survival stats to comfort is the normal path of a thief in wvwvw. If you want to do it all I’d recommend at least the main armor as berserker. If you want some more survivability in wvw throw in some cavalier, soldier(both karma purchasable), valkyrie, or knights trinkets.

In spvp the berserker amulet is all you’ll need.

Berserker weapons, at least one of each you can use. Two if you like those setups (dd, pp), or you need additional sigil options(shortbow).

Buildwise 66002 or 560(30 or 03) for pve.
some fun spreads to first get comfortable in wvw are 26600, 06620, 20606 for dagger mainhands(usually) and 20066, x606x for swords. Some people come off SA Traits once they are more comfortable. Some keep them. All preference.

Good luck and I hope this is beneficial to your journey.

Also these are my opinions and I’m a scrub with a little under 2k hours between my thieves.

Queue is my guess. I get bags from alt+f4 rage quitters. I’ve dropped fights I was losing thanks to queue.

Hello all. My girlfriend and I are looking for a guild. We have our own personal for storage, etc, but we can’t do everything by ourselves.

I main thief, and her engineer – We have other characters.

Pretty casual, though I pretend to be hardcore.

We’re looking for a guild that can cover all aspects of the game, we generally wvw though. Currently on blackgate. We can transfer But would be a week or 3. Prefer no lower than t3 unless someone can sell t4 well.

Thanks for reading guys! Can send me a pm or contact in game. I might be a day or two before I can get back on though.

Open your world map and it tells you the total skill points in the world to gain. Figure out the cost of traits you want.

Subtract.

Also, once you hit 80 you’ll gain a point every ‘level’ after that.

Plenty of points. Not to mention tomes and scrolls available in various modes of play.

Profession based?
Warrior – bag of weapons
Guardian – ?
Thief – slimline backpack loaded with lockpicks, probes, mirrors, rope.
Elementalist – slimline pack holding vials and reagents.

Etc?

I’m on board.

I recently leveled a new character. I’m glad I was grandfathered in on my last one. This one was meh.

I certainly preferred getting a point every level, but gaining the traits and leveling wasn’t awful. I do however really dislike them being locked behind whatever.
I would much rather have it like spvp currently does. All “core” traits unlocked naturally (or even introduce a few per line per few levels), and pay or do whatever for the newly added GM’s. Hopefully add new traits for other slots. Treat them the same.

I do dislike lowering difficulty in lower areas. It wasn’t that bad when I was new a little after release. Orr events and density was a little much.

A positive side effect was removal of low level champ trains.

Overall I hope they just return what we had, and add more with this New system they’ve thought up.

Acro will have higher uptime on vigor and adds another dodge. Unless you eek out 2 more points for 6 in tricks, I would go the acro route.

Bug really one signet and might on signet?

#alwaysremember

You must ALWAYS remember.

It’s also dangerous to go alone, so acquire these.

I imagine a lot hopes it will drop the elitism down a notch. If the most effective way is going to be a slow crawl anyway, why complain?

I don’t know. Early trains of thought might not be the best.

I recommend devourer as a power build and Skelk if conditions. Though devourer is useful in either build style.

Informative if not long winded, yet I applaud your tenacity.

I would like to point out plenty of classes can burst someone down as quickly as we can, if not faster. Without stars aligning or favorable odds (vuln, might, up level, +1’ing) it’s generally not going to be 1 second – especially against anyone worth their salt. I’ll add more as I go back over It perhaps.

Great job. Bump for great justice.

Edit:
Proc stands for process. It processes the effects on said item.

Burst and Spike early in the guide are mislabeled.

“DPS Damage Per Second” colon consistency.

“Active/Passive” colon consistency.

In your steal section, I recommend you add in the importance of optimizing steal a la not using it during their dodge animation. You get no item and full cool down. You do move right into range of them with none of the on hit effects traited into steal primed to be wrecked, however.

In the revealed section perhaps mention non damaging condition application (choking gas pre nerf, on heal runes, etc) – even if the condition itself deals damage – will not reveal you.

I love your Skelk venom entry. Has anyone found anything amusing with a share build or anything? Lol… Anyway. Perhaps a pros cons of heals?
HiS: easily interrupted by people who are paying attention (unless cast already in stealth), I guess you mentioned some pros.
Withdraw: nearly uninterruptible. The conditions that directly melt you remain though.
SoM: even with signet mastery activation is a rough stunt to pull.

Maybe mention General rule of thumb for cluster bomb: if you need to blast let it go, damage? Detonate! GO GO GO!

Heartseeker – mention chill/swiftness interactions with leap finishers. (Chilled=travel less than listed range, swiftness=distance gained)

Scorpion wire uses: yanking tower defenders from walls, yanking people off points, short range low CD interrupt that can be extremely powerful when used correctly. I say short range because unless you are on top of them, it’ll interrupt and knockdown at the least (provided it’s projectile doesn’t bug out as you’ve mentioned). I vouch for and use it often. Most aren’t expecting it.

- looks as if I’m long winded as well.

I’m not trying to nit pick your guide in the slightest and hope I don’t come across that way. You’ve done a wonderful job! I’ll quit fine tooth combing it now. It’s just so much! a great resource if we could get it stickied!

Good luck!

I use it 20% of the time but more and more now that I’ve gotten another zerker set. I have travelers set in inventory. New set has pack runes. It has comparable uptime to thrill. I use it with 26006, and 50036. Good stuff.
Hangs around 70% crit without the fury and around 15k hp in the crit strikes build with practiced tolerance and more from guard stacks.

I find that with long reach, unless a longbow power ranger is very quick, he’s down as quick as rf would down me.

Another good one is sw2>shadowstep>inf signet>swap to DD set with intelligence and air>steal cnd > backstab. Have devourer or bv up and it’s almost a guaranteed down on anything else zerker. It… It is just so much distance. The game is down in time for return.

Basic rule of thumb

Do I want damage/pressure? Detonate.
Do I want to blast a field? Don’t.

You know. I was thinking…

We have 5 skill 2 handed weapons. Main hand and off hand (3 and 2 skill respectively) weapons.

Why no main hand weapons with 5 skills?

The swordsman with one blade?
The caster with one focus or wand?
The thief with one pistol or dagger.

You could get main hand and off hand open handed skills.

Throwing dirt
Snapping a regeant for an effect
Weaving a spell
Looking kitten

I don’t expect it or even really care if it’s considered. Just something fun to imagine as I’m bored and daydreaming about lore, etc.

I knew gw1 was great. I just hated no jumping. Yes that really did keep me from playing.

Once I saw there was jumping… I considered it.

Then I got sick of WoW, lol, eq, bl2 and a slew of other games for the 3rd-600th time.

Grabbed 2 copies for my girl and I. Probably is the best I’ve played since Kunark, and then vanilla wow/bc.

Not because they relate. It set a new bar.

I know I’m going against what I’m about to say, but:

Just let it go…

Erm. I mean let the thread die.

msalakka.4653:

Am I supposed to go into General Discussion and talk about why I don’t give a flying kitten about the Living Farmville content? Is that how this works?

Actually that would probably be better in the living story forum.

Also I wouldn’t be able to play unless I dropped a few tiers if it was any more rough on my rig.

It’s not even long range. We have the shortest offensive range with ranged weapons.

But it makes plenty of sense.

Also. Have you ever been robbed? They were holding a knife or, wait for it. Firearm.

It’s not swiftness. It’s only 25%. There ARE alternatives for those classes be it traits or runes. If this is the case guardian will need more condition access. Thieves will need protection access. Necros will need to gain more mobility.

Hopefully you can see where homogenization is a slippery slope.

Edit: eles CAN maintain perma swiftness through traits on top of signet of air(which blinds and breaks stun, thieves only blinds no stunbreak -activatable portion of course).

after soloing a few champs and general play I would estimate I used cnd+steal around 75 times. I would estimate I used inf signet with it about 10. Air and Fire on Daggers, I have Mug traited. I don’t use SA line.

2/6/0/0/6

I was never revealed through it. My guesstimation would be latency, but I wasn’t there when you did it.

it’s fun and all, but the lack of range (not counting the gap closing) kills it for me. I used to run around like this, but especially now with the engineers everywhere, I need that bow. I can’t take them out without it – and even then it’s rough most of the time. They tear me up if I get in their circle too soon.

I use fire air and mug and haven’t had an issue past few days(or while that I recall). I’ll play around more tonight and report back.

You are in the right. We don’t have safe stomps. We have stealth and step stomps. Can shadowstep away during stomp and return right before animation ends for spike.

For the most part though, keep poison up and high pressure with cbomb detonated.

I mod keys anyway. It’s no trouble.

37 mesmer like a week after I got the game. I made her blonde and after getting to where mesmers finally opened up to be fun, and I couldn’t handle the voiceover trying to mesh it onto my character. I rolled an asura thief and fell in love with them both from there. Remade my mesmer though. Eventually.

Cntrl shift and h is my ui hotkey. I call it hardcore mode. It’s fun to run around like that and ever so beautiful.

But I get what you’re saying and support it fully.

I laugh they buffed larcenous for that express purpose. Nerf that purpose. Then we have greater need for it now than we did when it was first revamped. Lol.

Don’t forget last refuge in that list sir vincent! hehe jk, where is that one of 600 threads about last refuge?…

;p

thief can engage from 1500 and beyond with the right weapon/trait sets.

easiest is going to be 2 points in Trickery for Long Reach (giving up Flanking Strikes or Thrill of the Crime), making steal a 1500 engage. It really throws those LB rangers for a loop spiking them down first, but it’s still tough if they are any good.

Rest involves inf signet, sword2, steal, shadowstep for some really crazy distances.

Dad’s disadvantage is having to land cnd to burst. The weapon set offers an easily counterable evade frame. The cnd disadvantage is also tied into initiative management. It offers no defensive boons and no defensive conditions. It is raw calculation.

Do will net you similar results with less burst and much more survivability.

Sorry on formatting. Phone!
Edit: dad = dd- auto correct for the lose!
Edit2: do = dp… Need to save those words lol!

They fixed mug with stealth on steal but priming cnd still blows it. Any damaging sigil I would imagine as well.

Hey guys just use runes of infiltration and then you won’t know which one to be mad at!

:)