I only play my thief and I’m working on my third full exotic armor/weapon set.
From my experience, condition damage is a great balance between durability and damage, but is practically only good if you’re running around by yourself. If you want to learn how to play a thief better, play a full glass-cannon. It keeps you on your toes because you cannot afford to make any mistakes — in other words, it’s fun. You really can play a thief any way you want to, you just have to be creative with your choices of your build and gear. It’s easiest to learn to play very defensively and choose your gear in that same manner, slowly switching over to more damage the more comfortable you become with the class.
I’m speaking from a WvW perspective.
Fix rendering and people will see how not overpowered thieves are.
I just started using S/D after the patch and I find it to be the best weapon set we have available. I can’t imagine how effective it was before the patch.
As a player who has been messing around with my P/D thief for about a month now, all I really use is Cloak and Dagger, auto-attack, and the occasional Dancing Dagger. With my utilities, it’s very easy not to die. Every thief builds seems to rely on one particular tactic because that’s the direction our traits point us. There isn’t much way around it with the limited or lacking weapon sets.
Very nice video too. I’ve been noticing more Necromancers fearing me out of Shadow Refuge along with a few other tactics you’ve demonstrated as well.
“I know how to use Shadow Trap effectively”
“My P/P traps build owns everyone in WvW”
I used that up until about level 50 in PvE and it was great for then.
I think you’re fluid with your keybindings.
I think it is balanced. Both of those builds are so bad to anyone who knows what they’re doing and can only perform their fragile combo every 45 seconds or so.
He said he’s running a Backstab build which would imply that he has hardly any defense. Yes, I’d say he is squishy. I also have no idea about the 18k Backstabs you have witnessed. 100B is not a good skill and all you need to do is dodge the stun or immobilize that comes before it.
(edited by Thorp.7982)
Heartseeker is much better for mobility than the shortbow is if you don’t have auto-locking the target on. Withdraw to get out of immobilize and quick travel, and make sure you have the trait that gives you endurance regeneration upon healing, practically giving you permanent swiftness with only one or two seconds of not having it every 15 seconds or so. There’s of course Shadowstep, Roll for Initiative, etc. if you feel you need those too.
I pretty much just use it as a last-ditch effort if I cannot stealth. It’s great for when you get dazed or immobilized by a large group of people.
You have about 300 more power and 150 more condition damage than I have. I’m 0/0/30/20/20 with Carrion everything, duration, etc. before Corruption stacks. Take that as you will.
Well that’s what happens when you’re squishy.
Daggerstorm is bad in almost all situations, especially in PvE, and Thieves Guild is better than decent in almost all situations. Basilisk Venom is only good for the Backstab combo. I’m sure our elite skills are better than some of the other classes, but nothing compares to the Moa elite mesmer skill in my opinion (in terms of PvP-type activities).
Blindness spam with an offhand pistol, and a shortbow is the way to go.
Basically he’s stacking bleeds with the auto-attack from the pistol out of stealth. He’s healing while in stealth also and very evasive. The venoms give him might and heal him when he uses them too. There is also a blind-on-stealth trait so you can stomp players easily when you Cloak and Dagger to stomp.
It’s hard to tell you how to improve on it because that depends on your play-style. I have a play-style similar to what his seems to be, but my traits and utilities are pretty different. I feel my build has more survivability.
“FOR GREAT JUSTICE!”
All the time in WvW.
I think it’s just glass-cannon with a traits that give initiative back based on critical hits, having the extra initiative trait, etc. I’m assuming that’s what is going on based on their 13k HP and high critical hits. You could probably figure out the traits based on how many Cluster Bombs they spam at full initiative, or test and compare in the PvP training area.
I’m pretty sure it’s removed, at least for now. I’m interested in the character customization, myself.
I played a glass-cannon back-stab thief up until level 80 and changed to a defensive pistol/dagger thief upon 80, basing my thief’s build off of the concepts of a YouTuber named Slic (Wild Bill).
Here is the build he uses:
http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#mckMzzzz0MMxvMMMxvMG0xG0mRosqcR8khG7kiO7khf7kiO7khG70z7kuB70z7kIN70z7kG270z7owZ70m
Basically you’re stacking bleeds, using Cloak and Dagger whenever you can to do this, and healing and gaining might whenever you use venoms or are in stealth. It’s great for taking on multiple monsters, mostly due to the stealth (obviously) with an extra added 1 second stealth minor trait and the blind-on-stealth major trait.
It’s great in PvP obviously too:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GTrN8vtwAg&feature=plcp
(edited by Thorp.7982)
When I gather resources, typically I use Shadow Refuge. Underwater, I almost always use a harpoon gun because you can seemingly kite forever with it.
Using blindness is probably the best solution, at least for me. If we can’t get our Cloak and Dagger in, it messes up the rhythm and we’ll either have to waste a utility skill, heal, or be vulnerable/run for a few seconds. Immobilize screws me pretty badly sometimes too as there are hardly any skills to remove this effect. Also, it helps to be a Mesmer.
I’ve had the same problem since launch and I have luckily found my class, Thief.
From what I understand, it sounds as if you’re seeing the classes very narrowly. Look for builds of what you think each class has problems with, and you might get a better understanding of how you can make up for the weaknesses of particular builds — and see more clearly your options. It also helps to browse each of the class sub-forums.
You could also use a pistol offhand with your dagger mainhand and use the number three and five skill to chain-blind for effectively killing harder enemies in PvE. If you use your number two in the number five blindness field, you become stealthed which enables you to back-stab also. And yet another option with a pistol offhand is using a mainhand sword and using your number three skill while in the blindness field to hit multiple enemies for good damage in melee range.
Just some ideas you may be interested in.
The high risk, high reward gameplay of the thief is the most fun of the professions in my opinion. Play a thief well and you will hardly ever take damage in PvE. It’s rewarding having to stay on your toes.