Guild Wars 2

I too find this a horrible idea. Init-regen increase or init-refund is the best solution here. I think Anet is going towards the right direction here.

This is what I suggested in one of my posts;

Counter-Solution (hypothetical/non-tested):
- Increase initiative gain based on the amount missing.
- 100% init = .75/sec
- 75% init = +25% (.93/sec)
- 50% init = +33% (1/sec)
- 25% init = +50% (1.13/s)
- 0% init = +66% (1.25/s)

BlaqueFyre.5678:

When you swap to another weapon set after blowing your cos on first set you have a whole new set of cos to blow whiles thieves do not we waste our initiative supply we swap weapons we still have no iniative.
Plus it doesn’t reset skills on cd when you weapon swap you have to wait to swap again is all

I’ve already cover that in my last post. If a warrior choose to blow all their cooldowns on both weapon sets, they will be waiting for a long time to blow them all again. Some of their skills even goes upto 20s cooldown — that’s 20 initiatives we gain in that time frame under the proposed Dec. change. They have to trait to reduce their cooldown while we will get it naturally.

So I don’t see the problem with weapon swapping compare to the proposed change to initiative. The problem I have is while we lose effectiveness the longer the fight becomes, warrior builds up a secondary resources for a massive damage skill without sacrifices.

BlaqueFyre.5678:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Imagine that our Initiatives bar starts at zero and fills up over time. For instance you are using D/D and every time that init-bar goes to 3-init, Heartseeker becomes available to use, in other words, it’s out of cooldown, but we want to use CnD instead, so we conserve that init and wait — effectively placing HS on a cooldown.

The wait time to get from zero to 6-init defines the cooldown rate for CnD.

However at 6-init we have 2 choices, we can either CnD or use HS twice. When our target drops to 25% health, it is more profitable to use HS twice — other profession have no access to this kind of choice, they are stuck with using the skill then wait for cooldown.

Can you imagine a Warrior doing 100-blades twice in a row? This is the kind of advantage that Initiative gives us Thieves.

Unfortunately, Initiatives places CnD in an indefinite cooldown as long as we are spending initiatives as soon as it becomes available. If I keep using HS as soon as I get 3-init, then CnD will never get off cooldown. Warriors on the other hand, they have the Adrenaline system that allows them to build up resources that allows them to deal a massive amount of damage without sacrifices.

Imagine if the warrior has to build up adrenaline to use their skills, they will be the loudest among the whiners. Because every time they use their axe skill, they will put Eviscerate in an indefinite cooldown. If the Warrior choose to bank the adrenaline just as we choose to bank init to get to CnD, they too will be doing kitteny damage and they will QQ until the end of time.

If ANET looks at the initiatives from this perspective, they will gain the understanding on how initiatives works. Comparing it to a profession with 2 resources is not a fair comparison.

This is true to an extent, but it doesn’t take into account that on weapon swap other classes have full abilities while thieves do not we are still tied to the same initiative we had before swapping.

Weapon swapping is beyond the scope of your original post and my post is in response on comparing Init and CDs — so I obviously did not cover the effect of weapon swapping.

Besides, what exactly is the problem with weapon swapping in terms of init-regen? Sure a new set of skills are available but it doesn’t change the fact that the previous weapon skills are still in cooldown for non-init users. The availability of the second set doesn’t necessarily means that they received a cooldown reduction, in fact, the profession is stuck in the set after swapping while the weapon swap is in cooldown. Also skills on the first set with cooldown less than 10s now received a 10s cooldown after the swap. Every profession deals with this limitation.

Only warriors has the ability to manipulate the weapon swap rate, but even though they can swap sooner, doesn’t necessarily mean that the skills will be out of cooldown. Most of their skills have cooldowns longer than 10s.

If we compare Axe #2 (6s CD) to Dagger #2 (3init), for instance, at the rate of 1-init/sec (proposed Dec. change), we get to use our #2 skill more often than the warrior even if they choose to swap weapons back and forth. Swapping in this case will actually not going to be favorable to the warrior since most of our #2 skills only costs us 3-init.

The only edge that the warrior has is their adrenaline skill that deals a lot of damage the longer they remain in a fight.

Switch.4892:

Excalibur.9748:

Critical strikes is still mandatory. 30% crit chance, 30% crit damage alone can not be passed on.

Now add onto that executioner or hidden killer…..

CS tree still mandatory for non-condi thieves.

Agreed. As useful as Opportunist was, there’s still too much other reasons to be forced to sink 30 points into critical strikes. This change will not give us any more variability than we already have.

I can see why you guys think that way, Jon explained it poorly. What I think he was saying is that, those whose build doesn’t directly benefits from CS puts 15 points into CS just to supplement their initiatives regen by picking up Opportunist. So those builds that spends a lot of initiative are forced to put 15 pts into CS even though they are not crit build. And because they have already put 15pts into CS, they might as well go 30 pts into CS — thus pigeon holing a lot of players into building CS.

Improving the init-regen and making Opportunist less attractive, they are hoping that those who are not crit build will not feel obligated to have 15pts into CS.

Their goal is give back 15-30 pts that those builds can put somewhere else — unfortunately, Jon and his team have not specified where exactly can we put those points other than back into 15pts in CS. :/

I can see their intention, but I think they have the wrong solution. Instead of making Opportunist less attractive, perhaps making other traits more attractive and useful instead. The only reason why people are pigeon holed into CS15 is because there’s really no other better alternatives.

BlaqueFyre.5678:

Yes but my question again is, how do they expect us to swallow the comaprison between our initiative resource vs the cooldowns of other classes they can be on full cd and get all skills back at once and use all of them, thieves do not have that convenience. So how can they justify saying

JonPeters.5630:

Let’s break down this thief change a bit more so we can dispel any notions that this is going to ruin thieves.

We are increasing base regen by 33%. This is basically equivalent to a patch notes that says: “Warrior: Cooldown on all weapon skills has been reduced by 25%.”

Imagine that our Initiatives bar starts at zero and fills up over time. For instance you are using D/D and every time that init-bar goes to 3-init, Heartseeker becomes available to use, in other words, it’s out of cooldown, but we want to use CnD instead, so we conserve that init and wait — effectively placing HS on a cooldown.

The wait time to get from zero to 6-init defines the cooldown rate for CnD.

However at 6-init we have 2 choices, we can either CnD or use HS twice. When our target drops to 25% health, it is more profitable to use HS twice — other profession have no access to this kind of choice, they are stuck with using the skill then wait for cooldown.

Can you imagine a Warrior doing 100-blades twice in a row? This is the kind of advantage that Initiative gives us Thieves.

Unfortunately, Initiatives places CnD in an indefinite cooldown as long as we are spending initiatives as soon as it becomes available. If I keep using HS as soon as I get 3-init, then CnD will never get off cooldown. Warriors on the other hand, they have the Adrenaline system that allows them to build up resources that allows them to deal a massive amount of damage without sacrifices.

Imagine if the warrior has to build up adrenaline to use their skills, they will be the loudest among the whiners. Because every time they use their axe skill, they will put Eviscerate in an indefinite cooldown. If the Warrior choose to bank the adrenaline just as we choose to bank init to get to CnD, they too will be doing kitteny damage and they will QQ until the end of time.

If ANET looks at the initiatives from this perspective, they will gain the understanding on how initiatives works. Comparing it to a profession with 2 resources is not a fair comparison.

Shirk.6421:

Then my question… why do you use the runes of speed when you use the warhorn/signet of rage to get swiftness which is more powerful? The 6th rune especially.

This rune grants a 36s swiftness that no other skills can grant, even the Elite skill Signet of Rage. Unfortunately, that’s all it can really do.

Sanduskel.1850:

Well they used the word, abuse, when referring to perma stealth, so I don’t think that anet agrees with you.

“Abuse” only means that they want “perma” stealth (more appropriately “extended” stealth) to stay but to be controlled by utility skills with cooldowns and not by weapon skills. Having it on the weapon set is the cause of the abuse, thus we’re going to have these upcoming changes.

Again, the extended stealth mechanic is not broken nor is the problem here.

Straegen.2938:

Its not a significant buff or debuff if a player was already using Opportunist. The math seems to indicate that Opportunist will work as well as it did before.

Have you read this?

JonPeters.5630:

By reducing this trait and improving base regen we are giving non-crit thieves 15-30 trait points back to spend where they want to.

JonPeters.5630:

TLDR; Thieves with 15+ in critical strikes and no other initiative traits will be slightly less efficient. All other thieves will be equally or more efficient.

Jon

This is why words are better than math. The math don’t lie, the mathematician on the other hand…

Sanduskel.1850:

Anet needs to stick to their guns. The community hasn’t demonstrated the capacity to look to the interest of the entire game.

I highly doubt that ANET thinks the same way you do otherwise they won’t even give their time collaborating with the community. And we all know that even ANET don’t have" the capacity to look to the interest of the entire game" either, otherwise we’ll all be dancing around the campfire singing cumbaya.

For example it has stoutly defended perma stealth, even though the rest of the player base despises that broken mechanic.

The mechanic isn’t broken, people are just too lazy to deal with it. Other games has a real perma-stealth (you can even go AFK while in stealth) but it wasn’t a big problem because of counter measures — and ANET lacks stealth counter measures. The ones we’ve seen so far are all meh.

If anet listened to the community, nothing would have changed.

On the contrary, it was because of the community the changes did happen. :/

The swiftness simply allows you to move faster even when in combat.

Other problems/issues
- When will ANET address the other major issues that are nagging at the Thieves right now?
- For instance, Shadow Arts 5 – Last Refuge.
- Are you aware of the issue we have with this trait ever since beta?
- If so, what are your plans on dealing with this particular issue?
- Can you post a compilation of issues that our profession is suffering from so that we have a list of things that needs to be addressed or tested?

Still Hopeful
I took a month break from GW2 because Chris’s post really kittened me off and I’m still kittened right now, but I want this game to succeed and I like the artists in ArenaNet especially Kristen and Ree, I like the work they do. So I am hopeful that with your current effort to collaborate with the players that you’d soon find your identity and simply be yourself. Also take the time to understand each professions and give them identity and purpose. What exactly do you intend to do with the Thief profession? As of right now, we are simply filling a gap between a warrior and a mesmer, but all these times we are struggling to show you what the Thief profession is suppose to be only to get ignored.

I personally appreciate the time and effort that Jon Peters is giving us that we finally have someone to talk to and get some clarifications on things. My main concern is that these changes seems to balance the PvP game play and the limit on Vigor, for example, will drastically hurt the PvE players like me. So hopefully, when they are testing these changes that they are also testing it in PvE contents especially in dungeons and fractals.

Best of luck, good to be back. See you in game.

Vigorous Recovery and Survivability
Goal:
- This prevents these thieves from evading too much and too easily dealing with being disabled

Solution:
- somewhat reduced the effectiveness of high evasion thieves by reducing vigor up time
- Acrobatics III -50% (from 8s to 4s)
- Trickery VII -47% (from 15s to 8s)

Affected Traits:
(nerfs)
- Acrobatics III – Vigorous Recovery. Reduced Vigor duration to 4s from 8s.
- Trickery VII – Bountiful Theft. Reduced vigor duration to from 15s to 8s.
(buffs)
- Critical Strikes VI – Practiced Tolerance. Increased conversion from 5% to 7%.
- Acrobatics IV – Assassin’s Retreat. Increased swiftness duration to 20s.
- Acrobatics XI – Hard to catch. Moved to Master Tier.
- Trickery VIII – Trickster. Move to Adept tier.
(wth?)
- Acrobatics X – Assassins Reward. Increased healing scaling by 35%. Moved to Grandmaster Tier.

Reaction:
I agree that there are Thieves that evades too much, but this ties into the Initiative problem. When our initiative is low, we either hide in stealth or dance a musical chair, either way is to buy us some time for our initiative to go up. Reducing vigor duration for roughly 50% less is not a “somewhat” reduction. This is an excessive nerf and provides a huge window of opportunity for enemies to dispatch us. There is no balance in this change. It is obvious that your goal is to steer Thieves away from Critical Strikes and play as a nimble fighter — but there are several big problem here.

1) Furious Retaliation > Practiced Tolerance: Part of Thieves survivability is not having a lot health, but killing the target before dying. Therefore, this increase is not going to offset the nerf on vigor recovery. IMO, I rather not get hit than having a negligible amount of health and getting hit a lot. That increase of 2% will only add roughly around 200 health on a full Berserker gear — that will only mitigate a sneeze attack from a warrior.

2) Assassin’s Retreat needs to trigger on something else other than killing a foe otherwise this is useless. It has no value before and during a fight and when the target is dead, it only triggers if I dealt the killing blow.

3) Hard to Catch = Hard to Control (no control at all) which makes this trait a horrible alternative to Shadow’s Return. Also the swiftness buff is useless especially when feared — often times it only make me go off the cliff and die at 33% movement speed. :/ You guys need to rethink this one.

4) Assassin’s Rewards is just too deep. It was useless because the heal doesn’t happen at the beginning of a skill, so using a channelled skill like Unload, no heal until it finishes. Now that it is a GM, a 35% boost may not be worth it.

Counter-Solution (hypothetical/non-tested):
1) Practiced Tolerance is an odd trait. The vitality bonus would serve condition Thieves better so basing it on Precision under Critical Strikes is somewhat misplaced. The best place for this trait is Deadly Arts. DA needs better choices other than Mug and it can serve Condition build better since they don’t have to put points into CS just to get this trait.

2) Assassin’s Retreat – If this trait triggers after a Sneak Attack (like the name implies) — whether the target is dead or alive — even if it has kitten duration would still make it viable.

3) Hard to Catch – This trait mimics the functionality to GW1’s Viper’s Defense. That skill was fine tuned to make the shadow step more predictable and less random. Also instead of swiftness, Blindness would be more viable.

4) Assassin’s Rewards – Just reduce the cooldown or increase the recharge rate of healing skills based on the amount of initiative spent. This way, we get to control when we actually need that healing. My suggestions would be to increase the recharge rate by 1% per initiative spent up to the cap of 50%. IMO, this is more rewarding and reduces the urge to go in stealth to get the health regen. A Thief with this trait can stay in the fight and have a scaling survivability. With this change, it can rival Shadow’s Rejuvenation as a GM trait.

Permalink:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Dec-10th-Balance-Preview/first#post3133119

Initiative changes
Goal:
- Less dependency on traits that boosts initiative gain

Solution:
- Slightly nerf initiative traits; increase init regen by 33% (from .75 to 1 init per sec)

Affected Traits:
- Critical Strikes 15 – Opportunist. Increased trigger chance to 50%. Increase cooldown from 1s to 5s.
- Critical Strikes VIII – Signet Use. Reduced initiative gain from 2 to 1.
- Acrobatics IX – Quick Recovery. Reduced initiative gain from 2 to 1.
- Trickery 5 – Kleptomaniac. Reduce initiative gain from 3 to 2.

Reaction:
IMO, this is not balance at all. Although I can see that these traits can cause an Initiative overflow at the beginning of a fight (i.e. crit-ing with backstab at full initiative) but they do their job as expected when the fight drags on. The main problem with initiative is that, as the name implies, it’s only good at the time of initiations and it’s really horrible at lasting fights. Without initiatives, we either flee or die. The current Opportunist (30% + 1 init 1s CD) allowed us to stay in the fight because only through auto attacking that we can regain our Initiative back. Imagine if Warriors has to build up adrenaline before they can use their skills, that would be frustrating for them also. This is where Thieves at when our initiatives are low and this is the reason why most Dagger thieves spams Heartseeker because it is the cheapest skill and we don’t time to wait for a full initiative to pull off a meaningful combo. This is the main reason why you see a lot of evading Thieves also, we are trying to buy some time while we helplessly wait for the initiative to go up.

Counter-Solution (hypothetical/non-tested):
- Increase initiative gain based on the amount missing.
- 100% init = .75/sec
- 75% init = +25% (.93/sec)
- 50% init = +33% (1/sec)
- 25% init = +50% (1.13/s)
- 0% init = +66% (1.25/s)

Well Anet have posted this today.

Judging by that, the game is not going in a direction I hope it would go. So Chris asked;

Is this a journey you want to take?

Then I realized, that is not the journey I want to take. Therefore, I would like to thank you all for a great Thief community, you Thief players are the best players in GW2 in my book.

Vile.5678:

Coupled with S/D you can strip the boons…

That actually can backfire when against a Necro. I learned that the hard way last night. Stripped the necro off of buffs, BAM, my buffs are now Conditions. >.<’

freelancecoma.8629:

Hm well, it was supposed to be pve, but I suck hard at using it there. Id recommend trying it in pvp. I actually killed stuff there. Hotm is just easy on my cpu for recording. I hang out I hotm all the time. Its my “zen garden”

That’s what I thought. Because this build can work if you build a party around it.

The problem I’ve seen in the video is the execution, mainly due to the fact that you miss a lot of chances in capitalizing the strengths of this build. I see a lot of weaknesses, but we’ll not focus on that, let’s know your strengths first.

Pointers:

1. As a former D/D user, I spent a lot of hours trying to get CnD -> Steal -> Backstab timing correctly. This is a great way to position yourself for a Backstab. You need to practice this because this is your main strength.
2. Capitalize on triggering Hidden Killer as much as you can.
3. Chocking Gas and your Uncatchable caltrops makes a good combination. Try to lure your target into your Poison field, then dodge backwards spreading caltrops.
4. Death blossoms -> Dodge (Uncatchable) is also a great way to stack bleeds

I believe if you work on your strength with this build, this build can work. However, watching you how you fight in the video, it seems to me that you fear melee range. You might want to create a build that complements your playstyle. This build may deliver a lot of damage, but if it’s not a match for you, the build will fail. I’m speaking through experience since I’ve tried a lot of builds and failed until I made the one I am using now.

Good luck.

We need more skills not more weapons.

Each weapon should have atleast 2 sets of skills that we pick and choose which set to load out with.

Example: Dagger main-hand
Set #1: (Double Strike-WildStrike-LotusStrike) + Heartseeker + (TwistingFang-DeathBlossom-ShadowShot)
Set #2: (DisruptingStab-FoxFang-MoebiusStrike) + FallingLotusStrike + (PhoenixStrike-BladesOfSteel-IronPalm)

One question: Is this a PvE or PvP build?

Zacchary.6183:

It probably seems as though it never crits because the damage is so minute. However I run with 40% crit chance minimum and I can tell you I have seen it crit…. for ~230.

In fact I have seen Critical Haste proc right after I shot black powder.

Interesting. That’s news to me. I’ve never been in a circumstances where my BP actually hit something, let alone trigger a crit.

Thanks

Keth.1968:

Yeah but I was talking about S/P or D/P ! It’s all my point !
I said “head shot dosen’t trigger ankle shot if your main weapon is not a pistol”, if you respond “it works with P/P”, you’re almost saying the same thing than me ^^

I already explained it. Skills #1-#3 are skills from your main hand and skills #4-#5 are skills from your off hand.

Obviously, Skill #3 from S/P and D/P will not trigger Ankle Shots even though in animation it shows that you are using your pistol.

Can’t see how to prove it… do like me : go to hearts of the mists’ golems, and spam head shot with P/D, rampager’s amulet, agility signet and precision runes equipped and 30 critical art (74% crit chance)… after 10m of this without any ankle shot triggering, you can still argue it was bad luck :s

One problem. P/D don’t have Headshots. :/

But if you meant D/P, that’s exactly what I will do when I get home tonight.

Come on that’s my point again ^^
It’s a pistol skill, and ONLY a pistol skill.
Ok “dual wield” is a thing, but it dosn’t mean those skill use both weapons. It’s just a classification.

S/P #3 IS NOT a pistol skill.
D/P #3 IS NOT a pistol skill.
P/D #3 IS a pistol skill.

evilapprentice.6379:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Can you make that case more stronger by adding supporting evidence? Can you show the loss of power and the increase in mobility in using Sb?

As Thief players, we all know this like the back of our enemies, but Anet don’t have devs playing Thief so they have no idea. So can you explain your claim that someone who has not played Thief will understand?

I wont say I completely disagree with you, but I’m not a paid employee of Anet – if I have to explain why Sb is more mobile, less powerful secondary weaponset then say D/P, I just don’t have the time. Some more complicated interactions could probably benefit from having an experienced thief explain them, but if Anet really needs me to explain the above, all I can offer is “Read the weapon skill descriptions, and look at the damage numbers”.

lol. That only works if you’re talking about Warriors.

With Thieves, we have to run a thousand miles, jump a hundred hoops, and swim across the Grand Canyon before they even bother looking our way.

I agree that our base Init regen makes the class nigh unplayable – I’ve made posts about it before. I personally feel the gap between base Init regen and traited init regen should be narrowed, but that overall init regen shouldn’t be any higher than it is now for a player who has traited heavily for init regen.

Yup, I remember that thread. To me, the down time after a burst leaves a bad taste in my mouth a lot of times specially with the ridiculous Revealed debuff.

You’re spending an awful lot of initiative there in 10s – a single attempt at mitigation by your opponent (dodge, block, immunity, applied blind, etc…) will render that burst largely ineffective and leave you scrambling for the Init to finish them off before they heal/escape/down you. P/P in it’s current form is a big risk, seeing as all your damage is highly Init dependent. Even if we considered a well designed P/P (which for sake of argument is Direct damage based), it’s not like AA will fulfill the “burst” role.

Often times I see my target panic at the sight of burst and they commit in making mistakes. But I agree that against a seasoned opponents, a better way is needed. So I guess, that’s another factor we need to consider.

Will the weapon set combination too punishing to unseasoned players and at the same time trivial against seasoned players?

I think we already know the answer to that.

They also don’t seem to take any thief related advice from the boards – I see them caving to “Wah, stealth is OP” pressure slowly but surely. I see them considering nerfing S/D because players don’t want to learn to time things. P/P has been abysmal since the basic meta stabilized back in Sept 2012, and it’s yet to be addressed, or even acknowledged (AFAIK)

I can’t even begin to understand their development process. We got “boon hate” and “torment” out of the blue. We got a lot of unexplained nerfs and “bug fixes”.

But as far as the upcoming update (Oct 15), they are focusing that update on support role. However I am anxious on what they are doing with the traits, moving them around.

If it is was so strong, I think we’d be seeing alot more of it. In the recent tourney, we saw 3 S/D SB thieves, but not a single S/D D/P thief. Again, this might be due to how necessary SB is for team fights/mobility, but even if in the future that changes, you’re talking about having those 2 different skill sets available to you for 10s at a time. HS is useless if you need it with 5s still on your swap CD. Your opponent has 10-12s to spam their boons and take advantage of them when they see you swap from S/D to D/P. I still don’t really see what’s wrong with 2 sets that follow the same basic damage philosophy (Direct damage, Condition damage) that each have their own strengths and weaknesses. That sounds to me like a way of playing the class that relies on a lot of skill and planning.

Using the tourney is really not a good sample when discussing about weapon set combination only because the choice is based on team composition and team strategy. If you remember in GW1, the build changes if the team will split or stay together. In a split, you’ll choose a more well rounded build, but if you stick together, you may choose to go all glassy.

Now if we look at the synergy of the weapon sets, we can see that D/P + Sb has no synergy — Sb in this combination is just a utility set. S/D + D/P on the other hand, you can combine the two set to practically evolve a new set. If your swap is in CD and your opponent is spamming boon and you’re stuck with S/d for 10s, then why aren’t you stripping the boons? By the time you strip the boons off of them, I’m sure they’re either dead or wide open for your Heartseeker.

It’s really is a strong weapon set combination.

Zacchary.6183:

Galandil.9641:

Zacchary.6183:

I think all our problems would eventually be solved if anet played the thief.

Won’t happen, they’re all too busy playing warriors.

Did i do this right?

That explain the lack of Devs playing Thief. lol

Keth.1968:

You’re insulting my intelligence ^^ have you tested by yourself ?

I’ve used P/P ever since and have used Ankle Shots.

Headshot and black powder never trigger ankle shot if the main weapon isn’t a pistol.
(there is still the possibility that’s only true in spvp ^^)

You have to prove that claim and in return, I will prove my claim also. Fair enough?

Dual weapon skills are main weapon skills.
Shadow Strike is a great exemple. This skill deal a dagger hit, shadowstep you backward, then deal a pistol shot. Both hits are affected by pistols traits like ankle shot or pistol mastery. And the traits dagger training doesn’t affect it at all. So it’s not weird for a mechanic point of view, but for a logic point of view, you see a dagger hit affected by pistol training.

No, I see a “pistol skill” affected by “pistol” training.

Really really hard to explain those stuff in english ^^

I think you did well.

Zacchary.6183:

Black powder does damage.

I’ve never seen it crit though.

Have you? If so, did it triggered Ankle Shots?

I left it out since it’s irrelevant how often you’d use BP to trigger Ankle Shots. :/

evilapprentice.6379:

@Sir Vincent

I don’t really see the problem with D/D / P/P – other classes have well built weaponsets they can switch between, why not thieves? Having weapon sets that compliment each other doesn’t make them broken. This goes for every weaponset I can think of.

All I’m asking is that we also explore the weapon set combinations, in action if we can. This way it gives us better perspective when making a suggestion for change.

Basically, put yourself in Anet’s shoes. Someone made a suggestion. How would you go about on verifying the claim? What data would you need to justify the change? And based on those data, is the claim justified? If so, what changes needs to be made?

If we leave the judgement to Anet, we’ll get “boon hate” and “torment”.

And if you really think about it, ShBow is currently considered a nigh mandatory weapon in TPvP for team fights and mobility – not taking it might boost your ability in 1on1 (In this hypothetical situation where most or all our weapons were well built) and small skirmishes, but you’re sacrificing things for that power

Can you make that case more stronger by adding supporting evidence? Can you show the loss of power and the increase in mobility in using Sb?

As Thief players, we all know this like the back of our enemies, but Anet don’t have devs playing Thief so they have no idea. So can you explain your claim that someone who has not played Thief will understand?

The initiative system changes the formula just a tad, but I have to imagine they had that in mind when they developed the class – if their intention was to have a bunch of dysfunctional or UP weaponsets due to the init system, I’d imagine they would have dropped it instead.

I’m sure that we both know that the Thief profession doesn’t flow very well. It seems that the Devs doesn’t know what to make of this profession. If you recall during the development, each class used to have energy similar to GW1, then they trashed that but left it for the Thief and call it Initiative. While other profession enjoys the limitless use of skills, Thieve has to settle with bursting. So our problem is beyond just the weapon sets.

Part of the problem also is the regeneration of Initiative, I believe 1init/1.33s is too slow. If the minor trait “Preparedness” makes the regen rate 3init/1.33s, then I believe that it will solve a lot of the problems we are facing with our current weapon set.

There’s still a 10s weapon swap CD, so it’s not like you can switch to P/P for a quick headshot/BP then immediately switch back to D/D for your big burst damage.

Yes I agree that the swap cooldown is a limit, no different than profession’s skill cooldown. However, we both know that if we want to burst someone down, we start with a Backstab then pepper them with Unload interrupting heals with Headshots. Then if we really have to, we can finish them off with Heartseeker — but we know that when a Thief burst someone down, the fight ends sooner than 10s.

Hopefully the design team will notice any OP discrepancies and deal with them… 3 to 6 months after they’re released with inadequate testing, as is Anet’s MO.

Well I think it is obvious that they have no idea how to fix our profession and I really doubt that they are willing to fix it. So far, the “boon hate” and “torment” is blowing up in their faces.

You can already go S/D – D/P with a handful of specs, and it isn’t considered broken.

That’s a very good example on what I’m talking about. Just look at that weapon set combination; it has control, interrupt, burst, stealth, blind, condition removal, gap closer, etc. If it’s not broken, it is super strong. The power level of that combination even goes further up when used with the right utility skills, traits, and runes.

These things we need to consider, because if we don’t, we’ll get the change we wanted then we’ll get nerfed back to the ground again.

DanH.5879:

p/p sucks, tried it, didn’t like nor it’s of any good

Some player just don’t match the weapon set. I can never make P/D work for me, the set just didn’t make sense to me, specially #3 skill.

guardian pops reflection: you basically suicide

That’s true in about anything. That’s what reflection does. So why single out P/P?

guardian -> trollface

More like Warrior → steamrollolcopter

Keth.1968:

We have a very weird mechanic there…
If your main hand weapon is a pistol, skills 1, 2 and 3 can trigger this effect.
It’s getting funny for the skills 4 and 5: if both your weapons are pistols, it works, if your main weapon is not a pistol, it dosen’t, even if your second weapon is a pistol.

Well it does. The problem is that a crit has to happen, then 60% of when the crit happen it triggers. So 40% of your crits will not trigger this — and 100% of your crits will not trigger this when it is in cooldown.

To make it more clearly;
1) Did you crit?
1.1) If crits is yes, check if Ankle Shots is in CD?
1.1.1) If in CD is yes, no cripple.
1.1.2) If in CD is no, roll a 10-sided dice.
1.1.2.1) if roll is 1-6, cripple
1.1.2.2) if roll is 7-10, no cripple
1.2) If crits is no, no cripple

(More weird informations : all hits of the skill 3 are always considered as dealt with the main hand weapon. So for exemple if you have a pistol and a dagger, the dagger hit of Shadow Strike is considered like a pistol shot, so it’s affected by all the pistols traits except for riccochet)

That’s not weird at all because Shadow Strike is a pistol skill. Or better yet, #3 skills, whether dual-wield skill or not, is a main-hand weapon skill.

Imagi.4561:

Divinity.8041:

Imagi.4561:

Walker.3056:

Imagi.4561:

Walker.3056:

Imagi.4561:

Sensotix.4106:

panicbutton.1053:

What is this business of “a top thief”? This is quite kitteny to come into a forum and post “a top thief” as if everyone knows anything about this shadow. The ones that advertise themselves get torn down the fastest.

I bet I could nail down this “top thief” >:) What say you good sir? A duel, or multiple?

if you don’t know ningyou you have never played guild wars 2 pvp

thanks for the comment.

I’ve played GW2 PvP, and I don’t know him.

Its prob cause u play Spvp but you dont play it competitive like in a team that only do that or on the leagues thatteams played to get into PAX and stuff like that, if you even watched the games from the top teams going for PAX you would know him and know that hes awesome

I’ve also played tPvP.

Congratz? even my little brother can play tpvp if he wishes.. now competitive level as i said you probably didnt or tried just a little. w/e if you never hear of him its only your loss =/ good luck out there

Well, first the assumption was that “everyone who PvPs has heard of this person,” and then when I said that wasn’t the case, it became “well, then you’ve never played anything besides sPvP.” And now that I’ve refuted that claim, it becomes “well, then you’ve never played tPvP competitively.” Next, will I have to say that I’m a dev for my opinion to be valid?

The argument being presented here is a fallacy. I shouldn’t have to have a certain PvP resume to objectively consider someone a “top” player.

The arrogance and pretentious nature of your comments are disgusting.

Are you really going to be that nerdy? Let’s get this straight…

We have a random trying to act like this guy is not 1000x better than him, this thief is VERY VERY good. Stop trying to make the .01% happen.

You’re the guy who will always be like, well guys this is not always the case, when 99.99% of the time it is. God the earth needs less people like you.

Stop trying to catch people on technicalities, because we all know you can’t catch them on anything else…like your skill in gw2.

What ranking are you on leaderboards again? We didn’t catch it in your previous posts.

Nerdy? In the forums for an MMO? Lol. Pot, meet kettle.

I’ve never claimed to be better than Ningyou, nor have I said that he’s not a skilled player. I PvP, and I don’t know who he is. That’s about the extent of my opinion on the matter of his skill.

With the other things you mentioned, I’m not sure what you’re talking about. Make the .01% of what happen? What isn’t always the case?

Just ignore this guy and enjoy the interview. It’s obvious to everyone what this guy is trying to do — don’t waste anymore of your time.

nihavel.6592:

3 words:

Friend of luxon

Anyway i love your new philosophy “i want do this so i’m not interest in other objective.”

Ahahaha! Classic reply +1.

I remember those awful Amber runs for the Kurzicks. >.<’

Seras.5702:

It would apply to mainhand (1-2) and offhand (4-5). Skill #3 is a dual-wield skill so it wouldn’t apply. Even if you’re running P/P.

As to whether you should use it……

That’s simply not true. It triggers on Unload.

The double layered RNG might have clouded your perception.

evilapprentice.6379:

What compliments a bi-polar weapon set where the only 2 skills designed to do damage (AA and Unload) use entirely different stats to deal damage? There’s no secondary weaponset that suddenly makes P/P well designed – it’s still very, very kittentily designed.

Not saying that there is one, but I’m simply saying that weapon combination should also be taken into account.

Same as above. How does equipping a ShBow suddenly make it so that P/D isn’t at it’s strongest hitting 5->1 as often as possible in most situations? Once every 20s you might hit Shadow Stab to build range, then switch to ShBow I guess? The change to Shadow Stab was a good one, but the set still needs a little attention.

That’s just one example where there’s a synergy in weapon set combination, mainly due to the conditions and I’ve seen a well played P/D + SB before so I used it as an example here.

I agree that it needs attention, but when attention is given, weapon set combination should be taken into considerations.

Do you see alot of thieves running hybrids with access to burst that don’t make at least one of those sets worthless? If you’re running a condition focus (With access to burst, somehow), D/P is entirely useless and D/D is mostly useless. If you’re running a direct damage focus (with access to burst, believably), P/D is entirely useless, and P/P is mostly useless. You’re not gaining that much in versatility, and you’ve sacrificed Shadow Shot (a Strong skill) and Shadow Stab (a useful skill, buffed enough to finally break the 5->1 P/D monotony, if only a little). You also only have the opportunity to gain these benefits once every 10 seconds – Don’t get me wrong, if all of our sets were well designed, your point would be solid, unfortunately they are not.

That’s actually what I’m getting at. What if they designed them well without considering the weapon set combination? Can you imagine how broken D/D + P/P will be?

One issue that is currently standing out is that any changes to D/D will affect D/P, same with P/P affecting P/D. They need to make a stand and make a decision since the only way to avoid these issues is give D/D and P/P their own unique dual-wield sets.

Your big picture mostly crams weapons in to use 1 or 2 of their skills, which is the problem entirely. The weapon set should be well designed enough on its own that you have some reason to use most of the skills in the course of your average fight. Slotting P/P with D/D so you can unload at range, and have occasional use for HS and BP still leaves your basic AA useless, and body shot a waste of init (which may change after the added Immob in patch) which seems silly to me.

My goal is for you to consider them when none are wasted init and they are well designed. If we are to evaluate the weapon sets, we need to take the weapon set combination to be included into the discussion just to eliminate any wiggle room for Anet’s design team.

So in the end, we can say that, “look Anet, P/P is so horrible that whether we use it in PvE, PvP, WvW, in any weapon set combination, or in any build, it’s crap! And here’s the proof…and here’s the solution: D/D and P/P get their own unique 5-skills weapon set. Here’s the reasons:…”

Crazylegsmurphy.6430:

Raziel.4216:

What data are you using to reach this conclusion “LS is proving to be a larger and larger disappointment” ? The only one with access to real, non-anecdotal (worthless) evidence is Anet, and they decided to increase the # of LS per month, so I doubt it’s dissapointing.

They have data that shows how long, and how often I’ve done some task, but they don’t have my personal thoughts on them. If they choose to come to a conclusion (that I like the content) without considering any other variables, and then create even more content based on that conclusion, there will be a tipping point.

Well, when you do a content, it’s not just about the content. If the content encourage team work and you like teaming-up with your friends, then the content had fulfilled its purpose. Even if you are disappointed about the actual content, you cannot say that you are disappointed teaming-up with your friends.

And if ever that tipping point happen, just like you did before, just move on to the next game.

I think many players (based on these forums, in-game dead zones, map chat, etc) are growing increasingly impatient with the “Living Story.” Many, myself included are struggling with our feelings on this one.

One thing for sure. Even though GW2 is way bigger than GW1, it’s still not as big as a traditional MMO where there are tons of things to do. But even with traditional MMO, there are still dead zones and players growing impatient.

I feel torn because ANet will release new content that I don’t really enjoy, but I will do it anyway, for various reasons. I feel guilty because ANet sees me running along, mashing the “1” key and assumes I want more of that. The next update comes along, and it gets a little worse.

Now, what has happened is that I struggle to even log in. When I do, I blast through the content as fast as I can, so I don’t have to feel pressure to log in for the next two weeks. I read the update notes, wait for the patch, rinse and repeat.

It’s a circular feedback loop that will never be broken until ANet steps up and starts actually connecting player satisfaction with their time in game. If they don’t, a point will come where players will simply not come back.

I agree, it’s hard being in the minority. If all the minority who are dissatisfied leave the game and never return, GW2 will have 100% satisfied players.

Crazylegsmurphy.6430:

I think ANet may be having an issue with what could be called a false positive.

So, look at it this way.

Jenny works 45 hours a week at a fast food restaurant. Now, you could conclude that because of this she must love her job.

Now, this may be true, but it could also be due to some other factor such as bills she must pay.

Or;
- she like the people she works with
- flexible work schedules
- benefits
- reward program
- customers
- managements

I agree, there are many factors.

The Guild Wars 2 “Living Story” Could be much like this. ANet may be seeing an increase in players due to the “Living Story” but does that actually equate to satisfied players? To assume that because they’re playing a lot, they must be happy, does not factor in all the variables.

Well, if players plays for the same hours as Jenny, 45 hrs week, it would be hard to conclude that players hate, or unsatisfied with, GW2.

The question that I ask myself is, what happens if ANet is interpreting these results as positive, and using that as evidence to continue in that direction, yet player satisfaction may be more mixed.

I highly doubt that this is the only factor used. Just like Jenny, she may hate the job, but she likes the flexible hour, the benefits, and the people she work with.

I’m now quite nonchalant about what is coming next, what the achievements are, what weapons/Armour I can make, or what the story is. The only real reason I continue to log in is due to the friends I have made in game. This to is unfortunately not going so well as many of them are spending more and more time offline.

Just like Jenny, you log in due to your friends, thus she might choose to go to work due to her co-workers. She might not care about benefits and reward program at all, just like you not caring about weapons and armors.

So, I wonder if ANet has a system beyond these forums for gauging player satisfaction? I personally think it is time for them to put out a yearly survey that really drills down to how players are feeling.

I remember reading that they might have said (but don’t quote me on this) that they are looking at how many achievement points players earned per hour spent. Someone can be logged in for hours, but if they have not gained any achievement points, they are not doing anything at all. If you are logging in to do the Daily, you are gaining achievement points, thus you are doing something.

If you spent 45hr/week and earned 1,000 achievement points, then that is a very good indication that you love, and are satisfied with, GW2.

It would be a shame if they continued on this path, thinking all the logged in players are a great sign, only to find that that next update, or bug, or overpriced gem item, or change, tips the player base over the edge and it starts to erode.

So, in conclusion, obviously you are mistaken.

akbhx.3027:

Hi all,

For the talent Ankle shots in the critical strikes tree…

Critical hits with a pistol have a 60% chance to cripple foes for 3s. (Cooldown of 10 seconds).

… does this only apply to pistols in main hand or to both main and off hand pistols?

Thanks in advance :

In practice, it is difficult to notice a 3s cripple done by your off-hand pistol since the only damage skill is Headshot. The trigger of this trait is more noticeable when using Unload.

However, there are far better trait that you can use to cripple your target. Uncatchable is far better option because it’s not limited by an internal cooldown and no RNG — Ankle shot has double layer RNG (crit chance and 60% chance off of crit).

This is a nice build if you stay in a group/party but not a good build for solo — too fragile.

I’m curious though, why do you have condition damage food buff and crystal? Wouldn’t you benefit more if you use Power buffs instead? The extra damage you deal from increase in power trumps the damage you get from condition damage since you only have around 300 condition damage.

Imagi.4561:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Imagi.4561:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Imagi.4561:

The argument being presented here is a fallacy. I shouldn’t have to have a certain PvP resume to objectively consider someone a “top” player.

That’s your problem. If you disagree with the OP for calling someone — anyone — “top” player, then the matter at hand has to be considered as a subjective matter.

Forcing your view that this should be “objective” is absurd. A lot of the content in this thread points to the subjectivity of the the topic.

This is not an introduction about someone whom you know nothing about. This is a thread for those who do knows him or wants to know him. If you’re neither, why do you even bother to derail the thread? Just move along, for quaggan’s sake.

I don’t think I’ve “forced” any view. People were attacking opinions as not being “qualified” enough in PvP to be valid. I felt that was ridiculous, and I said as much.

I’m replying to what is being said to me, not intentionally derailing. It takes two to tango.

The topic is about a “top” player in PvP whom you will never find in your daily PvP activities. To say that you know not of him is only because you have not looked from the “top”. Things are blurry from the bottom looking up you know…a lot of things are not visible to you, you know, when you’re being overshadowed.

The assumption in this topic is that you know the subject. If you don’t, then you either research about the subject or you don’t. If you don’t, you really have nothing to say about the subject since you know nothing about it. Am I right?

So why go through all the trouble of make the thread about the “top” claim, than what the thread is all about — the subject?

You are derailing the thread and you don’t even know it? What kind of fallacy you think is that?

Your entire first paragraph was completely irrelevant and partly nonsensical. The fact that I’m not a “top” player has absolutely nothing to do with anything.

Where did I said that you have to be a “top” player? What I said is that you have to look “from” the top to see clearly.

I never said that I “didn’t know” the topic was being derailed. I said I wasn’t the only one responsible.

You said “not intentionally derailing”. So you’re now saying that you know that you are derailing the thread but not solely responsible?

By the way, you’ve done a top-notch job of getting it back on track.

What makes you think that I’m trying to get it back on track? O.o?

Also, I don’t know how you think logical fallacies work, but I’d like you to point out exactly where I “denied the antecedent.”

Oh my, still in denial.

Sensotix.4106:

i had the honour to invite Ningyou of Team Dopplers Effekt/Team Cheese Mode to an interview to share his opinion about his class the game and the current meta!

Imagi.4561:

I’ve played GW2 PvP, and I don’t know him.

@OP
There is a flaw in your post and this is the main issue why some weapon set are horrible: weapon combination.

Do you honestly use P/P just by itself? Or do you use a weapon off-set that complements P/P?

I know that P/D complements SB and by perfecting the weapons switching through practice, it is a powerful condition damage set.

D/D + P/P is also a powerful weapon set combination for hybrids with access to burst after perfecting weapon switching through practice. SoM is OP with these sets. This is like having D/D, P/P, P/D, and D/P within your grasp.

My point is, if we are to address any issue, we need to look at the big picture and not focus on individual weapon set or build. Looking them individually will really make you sad, but that is not all what they can do.

Nevertheless, I still want to see D/D and P/P have their own 5-skill dual wield set, instead of just the dual wield #3 skill.

Imagi.4561:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Imagi.4561:

The argument being presented here is a fallacy. I shouldn’t have to have a certain PvP resume to objectively consider someone a “top” player.

That’s your problem. If you disagree with the OP for calling someone — anyone — “top” player, then the matter at hand has to be considered as a subjective matter.

Forcing your view that this should be “objective” is absurd. A lot of the content in this thread points to the subjectivity of the the topic.

This is not an introduction about someone whom you know nothing about. This is a thread for those who do knows him or wants to know him. If you’re neither, why do you even bother to derail the thread? Just move along, for quaggan’s sake.

I don’t think I’ve “forced” any view. People were attacking opinions as not being “qualified” enough in PvP to be valid. I felt that was ridiculous, and I said as much.

I’m replying to what is being said to me, not intentionally derailing. It takes two to tango.

The topic is about a “top” player in PvP whom you will never find in your daily PvP activities. To say that you know not of him is only because you have not looked from the “top”. Things are blurry from the bottom looking up you know…a lot of things are not visible to you, you know, when you’re being overshadowed.

The assumption in this topic is that you know the subject. If you don’t, then you either research about the subject or you don’t. If you don’t, you really have nothing to say about the subject since you know nothing about it. Am I right?

So why go through all the trouble of make the thread about the “top” claim, than what the thread is all about — the subject?

You are derailing the thread and you don’t even know it? What kind of fallacy you think is that?

HELLruler.4820:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

HELLruler.4820:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

1. The main difference between a warrior and the thief is their armor type. Warriors wears heavy armor while thieves wear medium.
2. It seems that you are playing like a warrior when playing with your thief. You need to keep in mind your position and survivability. You need to dodge and evade all the time.

2. Are there any useful traits to help stay alive that I might be missing?

Thanks

Depending on your build, which I don’t know, I think stealth and stealth related traits will be good for you. Shadow Arts has a lot of survivability related traits.

lol, wait there. Thieves have only 10k base hp at lvl 80, while warriors have 20k. Defense is the main difference, not only the kind of armor they use

So what is “defense” exactly? Where does the “defense” number used to calculate armor comes from?

Oh, sorry, theres a stats called “defense”, so that got messed up.

No problem. I just didn’t like the fact that you “lol” at my reply when I specifically wrote “armor type” in my post implying that I was talking about the defense stats.

Defense means hp pool, armor, and damage avoid mechanics like block and dodge and going invulnerable and cond removal for this game

No they don’t. Defense means defense as stats. HP pool is HP or health. Armor is armor. Dodge is dodge. And evade is evade. Etc. Miscalling them “defense” only makes you a failure at communication.

Thats it. Warriors have more base hp and armor, they have blocks. The rest both classes have. The kind of armor is part of “armor” lol

Sigh, clueless. I’ll just add you to my “do not reply” list. Have a nice day.

ZennithRising.8653:

But today I just kept dying in the dungeons,

Problem #1:
This can mean anything;
- too much damage output = grabbing aggro = dead
- not healing yourself = dead
- standing on the “fire” (any pool that deals damage) = dead
- failed to dodge = dead
- afk = dead
- DC’ed = dead
- cat jumped on the keyboard = dead
- dog chewed on the power cord = dead + dead pet (possibly)

..and so on. So which is it?

besides that I have exotic armor, and people said that I should respec/change armor spec.

Problem #2:
Thief don’t rely on passive protection like armor, they rely on active protection like dodge, evade, and stealth.

So what is your current build? That included armor, runes, weapons, sigils, and traits.

I would also like to mention that I like using the short bow (a lot) and maybe dd? So I would like something that can keep me up, but also do some serious damage, maybe some support for my mates?

Problem #3:
You’re trying to be a jack-of-all-trade but a Thief is a specialist. If you want to do all these, I’ll take that warrior suggestion above.

If you play a Warrior, you get the bigger version of the weapons you want. You get Longbow instead of Shortbow, and you get dual swords instead of dual daggers.

Any information/ advice would help!

Also I think I need new armor and weapons, and taking into account the karma vendors aswell cause I have plenty of unspent karma… so if you could advise me with some armor aswell.

Thanks!

Solve the problems above. Then if you still decide to stay as thief, there’s a lot of thread that you can pick and choose to match your playstyle. But first, solve #1 (find your weakness), #2 (find your playstyle), and #3 (find your purpose).

GL.

Imagi.4561:

The argument being presented here is a fallacy. I shouldn’t have to have a certain PvP resume to objectively consider someone a “top” player.

That’s your problem. If you disagree with the OP for calling someone — anyone — “top” player, then the matter at hand has to be considered as a subjective matter.

Forcing your view that this should be “objective” is absurd. A lot of the content in this thread points to the subjectivity of the the topic.

This is not an introduction about someone whom you know nothing about. This is a thread for those who do knows him or wants to know him. If you’re neither, why do you even bother to derail the thread? Just move along, for quaggan’s sake.

skullmount.1758:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Zackie.8923:

apparently it’s a werechar

The key to human-charr procreation….interesting.

I thought that already happened with Jennahs secret Rytlock child…

It might have happen, but they cannot procreate — and this is the key — Jennah has to turn wereCharr.

The part that I have to collect some ticket scraps from Black Lion Chest to get a nice weapon skin was the last straw.

Not giving them anymore money until I see real content — that means dragons, Vigil cannons, etc.

Cyhann.2609:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Cyhann.2609:

But in the end it’s dagger because the last attack on sword isn’t too reliable.

I would think that those who uses Sword will make sure that the 3rd attack, the highest damage of the sequence, hits — I know I do.

Yes, sure but that doesn’t make it quicker and less telegraphed and easy to evade with
walking compared to the dagger one, and it’s quite annyoing to make sure that the last
hit actually hits imo, and I would really prefer a quicker animation like the one from
the warrior, even if it would make less dmg then, since it feels way more fluid. And
stupid looking attacks like those don’t fit the fast/stealthy theme of the thief anyway.
But in the end I guess it’s just personal preference, but I really think that those
animations should be swapped since it also feels off on the warrior, but whatever.

Warriors are Anet’s little brats. We can’t do anything about that, so comparing us to them will be a waste of time. The funny part is, Anet still think that we are the ones who needs to be nerfed. lol.

Quakeman.9378:

I run full dire and imho it works much better than carrion. If you’re running p/d you’re a condition thief and thus need more toughness and vitality simply to outlast your opponent. In other words: condi builds can take a while to kill someone so you need to be able to stay alive for that amount of time. The power is also wasted stat, as it won’t make that huge of a difference in my dps since your precision should be low (another wasted stat on a p/d condi build) and you don’t have much to any crit damage. There’s just no real point to sacrifice your defense for some extra power- you don’t need it.

You’re 100% right on the money here. I have nothing more to add.

In PvE, Dire set scale really well with Tuning Crystal buffs.

IMO, in PvE even if you are just running around naked, it’s viable. You don’t believe me? Just attend one of the open world boss fights — you won’t hear anyone complaining about someone running around naked during the fight.

Anyway, if it is based on Glass Cannon, I might have already seen it since even from beta, everyone was running GC build until nerf bat starts swinging and broke all the glasses.

My point is, it’s my opinion and if I think he’s a top player, then he is. In your opinion, if you think he’s a top player, then he is.

The sour buckets here are just trying to be politically correct even though they violate the very standard they want to impose on you.

freelancecoma.8629:

Lmao to verify, vincent and I do NOT have a homosexual relationship. I called him “my man” as a term of endeerment, because he has earned my respect. This can mean whatever he wants it to. To me it means I consider him an intelligent player, and someone who is a respectful person. So I sincerely hope my respect for him is valued by him cus I feel he deserves it. That means (assuming he also respects me in a similar manner,) that we have mutual respect for eachother. Just makin sure no one gets the wrong idea about either of us haha.

Respect among Thief players here are mutual and it’s a given, no need to mention it. And of course, you’re the only one who can disrespect yourself. So, if I am disrespected, I probably deserved it.

This will be my kind of Thief build.

freelancecoma.8629:

Ok, thank you for being clear in what you want to know. That being said, you can do whatever you want to increase your survivability as long as it makes sense and is viable in your preffered playstyle and role.
So to better answer your question, are you looking to be a dps in pve? If so, one way you can increase your survivability and maintain good damage is to throw 15 points into Acrobatics and grab Power of Inertia and the minor trait after that.

This gives you more dodges than usual, and therefore makes you more survivable while not reducing your dps (by much lol). You do not NEED ptv gear to imcrease your survivability. in my opinion in gw2, you can do any dungeon as a glass cannon, if you know 2 things, how to avoid all types of damage or at least counter them, and which mobs or bosses have “one shot” mechanics.

With the knowledge I provided for you I hope you can best answer your own question as you see fit. Gl in PvE!

Keep in mind that every time you dodge is a loss of DPS. Shadow Arts, not Acrobatics, gives Thieves the survivability without sacrificing DPS.

However I agree that it depends on the play style because I can see a high level of play style that can take advantage of Power of Inertia and turn a dodge into DPS boost. Unfortunately, someone has to practice it to perfect it, but if the OP is willing, he can take that crash course and skip the rest of learning process.

Strayhand.8216:

spoj.9672:

You just need to learn to evade key attacks, position yourself correctly and use blinds when fighting trash. Good thieves dont compromise dps for survivability, they stick with the 25/30/0/0/15 build. If you cant play with it then you may aswell just play a warrior and let someone whos better at thief play it or practise more.

I heard this game is so hard that only pro gamers are allowed to play certain classes well. Give me a break…of that KitKat bar.

There, I fixed it.

If he plays better than me, he’s a top player in my book. Care to argue?