Guild Wars 2

Grimwolf.7163:

Travlane.5948:

so the sigils also share the same cooldown if they are on a diff weaponset?

I believe so, yes.
For the same reason two weapons in the same set share a recharge; the recharge is tracked on the player, not the weapon. They probably don’t even have the proper game mechanics available to track it on the “weapon”.

that sux…i believe it SHOULD be different on a diff weapon set. makes sense. but prolly to hard for them to program. i mean they cant even made shadow step a teleport. shadow step is actually just a really quick sprint that u cant see bc its so fast. youliterally walk the surface area and trip stuff

Clockwork Bard.3105:

Travlane.5948:

Clockwork Bard.3105:

panicbutton.1053:

Side question!!

I’m playing around with p/d and am maximizing the amount of times I can go stealth so I can bleed them as much/often as possible. I trait for steal to stealth me… and I’m having some problems.

In the middle of combat, most of the time when I steal -> stealth, I get revealed almost instantly. Same goes for blinding powder. Are our stealth mechanics funky or is there something I’m not aware of? o.O I don’t chain the stealth one after another -- I realize there is some kind of internal counter prevention on stealth.

That’s why I dropped Hidden Thief when I was playing around with a stealth spec. It would’ve been nice, since my thief is a Steal-machine. I also have problems with the stolen Gunk bundle. I typically throw it, CnD, then try to stack 5 confusion with Sneak Attack. 75% of the time, it works. The rest of the time, it seems the Gunk pulse is treated as an attack and breaks my stealth before I can fire.

The only real use I found for Hidden Thief was to combine it with Shadow Protector and Mug to turn Steal into a small heal + regen. But the Shadow Arts tree has too many good traits for me to dedicate it to just that one combo.

steal into an instant backstab ….thats what this is best for. long reach too if u can fit it in. but panic is talkin about a totally different problem than what you are addressing.

I’m talking about stealth breaking immediately after I enter it. So is he. I’m not sure how that is different.

I only mentioned Shadow Protector as working with Hidden Thief, because it applies Regeneration the moment you enter stealth, and so it is not hindered by this problem.

if the gunk hits the ground first then ur good. or if u can hit sneak attack before it lands on them.

gear is actually really easy to get in this game. heres some ways to get it WHILE you enjoy the set you have …use d/d.

WVW drops badges that you trade for any kind of armor(100-150 per ish)
PVE drops all kinds of goodies that sell for money
DUNGEONS give tokens to trade in for armor(100-170 per ish) 60 per run per path
FRACTALS great money….this will always let you walk out with 2-3g per full run.

so just play the game iwth what you have and you will get the rest of your sets. wont take long. the first set is always the longest bc ur starting from scratch. LOOK:

your noob char farming: lvls 1-80 (90% of which drops crap)
now your 80 with exo farming: you only fight/explore good areas droping good loot

so you will get another set in 1/5th of the time.

so the sigils also share the same cooldown if they are on a diff weaponset?

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Travlane.5948:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Travlane.5948:

really dont think it can be done in 7-8 seconds ? :P

It seems that you got lost in the conversation. Your video further support my skepticism to your claim.

I said;
“It’s hard to believe that to be a duel since whoever you are dueling didn’t even try to defend themselves. :/”

Then you post a video beating up on a golem…. >.<’

well sorry i didnt have a video of THAT duel. but even if its 1 in 100 u dont think thats likely? ok ill do a few duels tnite. ill def do it to 1 person. wanna make a bet in gold that you will renig on?

I’m not saying that it’s unlikely, what I’m saying is; you might have done it as you say, but it’s not a duel.

well it was a duel….. i dont carry infil sig on my wvw build. period. or basilisk venom. stun and BV can really disorient people and allow you to get off combos. try it out. u might be surprised.

Clockwork Bard.3105:

panicbutton.1053:

Side question!!

I’m playing around with p/d and am maximizing the amount of times I can go stealth so I can bleed them as much/often as possible. I trait for steal to stealth me… and I’m having some problems.

In the middle of combat, most of the time when I steal -> stealth, I get revealed almost instantly. Same goes for blinding powder. Are our stealth mechanics funky or is there something I’m not aware of? o.O I don’t chain the stealth one after another -- I realize there is some kind of internal counter prevention on stealth.

That’s why I dropped Hidden Thief when I was playing around with a stealth spec. It would’ve been nice, since my thief is a Steal-machine. I also have problems with the stolen Gunk bundle. I typically throw it, CnD, then try to stack 5 confusion with Sneak Attack. 75% of the time, it works. The rest of the time, it seems the Gunk pulse is treated as an attack and breaks my stealth before I can fire.

The only real use I found for Hidden Thief was to combine it with Shadow Protector and Mug to turn Steal into a small heal + regen. But the Shadow Arts tree has too many good traits for me to dedicate it to just that one combo.

steal into an instant backstab ….thats what this is best for. long reach too if u can fit it in. but panic is talkin about a totally different problem than what you are addressing.

panicbutton.1053:

Side question!!

I’m playing around with p/d and am maximizing the amount of times I can go stealth so I can bleed them as much/often as possible. I trait for steal to stealth me… and I’m having some problems.

In the middle of combat, most of the time when I steal -> stealth, I get revealed almost instantly. Same goes for blinding powder. Are our stealth mechanics funky or is there something I’m not aware of? o.O I don’t chain the stealth one after another -- I realize there is some kind of internal counter prevention on stealth.

its funny you say this…… i made a post a few days ago about CND and such being buggy. blinding powder has always been like this and now it seems 10x worse. the only way know how to make this better atleast sometimes is to drop target then stop attacking then dodge roll then use blinding powder in the middle of it. that usually works for me. sad we have to do all that but yeah

Cloak and Dagger
Blinding Powder
Stealth on Steal
Hide in Shadows (more uncommon)

Daecollo.9578:

Obscure One.4357:

The subject line says it all.

I’m pretty much fed up with a class design allowing those who pick up the Thief class to spend less than a day with it and compete with some of the best DPS metagamers to ever put their hands on GW2…by pressing 2…a lot.

Now before you crazed defenders of all things Thief get all up in arms over another thread calling for a nerf, please read, let this idea bounce around in your head a bit, and then reply with an actual opinion.

Are you ready?

Are you sure?

Ok, here it is:

New sPvP and WvW Feature: Exhaustion “when activating the same non-auto-attack (#1 skill) weapon skill within 2 seconds that skill gains a 1.5 second cooldown that stacks in intensity.”

As far as I can tell this only effects skill spamming and doesn’t circumvent the initiative system, but rather encourages learning to play the class as intended. Pressing one key to victory is pandering to bad players and trivializing the class as a whole. Watching an initiative bar and playing Wack-A-Mole with the 2-key should not be the back bone of a play-style.

My biggest problem doesn’t stem from being attacked by this type of play style, oh no. I beat those kids like it’s a Chris Brown and Rihanna RP. The problem is my difficulty in learning the class. Everytime I try to get into it, I get myself into a situation in which repetitively pressing 2 is the best choice (cloak & dagger, backstab, they run…soooo heartseeker…still alive, still running, sooooo heartseeker…still not down? still running…heartseeker!) Other classes, of with I have 4 fully exoticed at 80, I’m forced to use something else, because the skill I’d like to use is on cool-down, so I have to figure out what to do with my other options. This is how I learn, and this prevents me from playing a non-2-spamming thief. I burn out my initiative pressing 2 and if it doesn’t kill them I stealth away and recover…and then try something else only to end up doing it again, which actually beats other thieves more often than anyone else, which is dumb, since I’ve collectively put in about 10 hours of game time into the class and only in sPvP.

As long as our other skills (not heartseeker/spam skills.), get a 200% – 250% base damage increase I will be fine with this.

Currently most skills are not used because of .. gasp.. low damage.

Also, Guardians out damage thieves atm. Warriors even moreso. Even rangers out damage thieves in the current meta. NECROMANCERs even.

Learn your class before you whine.

a zerk guardian can really put a hurting on somebody! especially with rage sigil going off!

might be a silly question here but oh well:

if you have 2 daggers and on each dagger is a sigil of rage….i know they share the same cooldown…..but does that give you 2x the chance at it going off bc there is 2?
for instance. sigil of rage: 10% chance to gain quickness on a crit for 3 secs.

so you hit something and Sigil A: 10% chance misses
on the same hit then goes Sigil B: 10 % chance Proc’s and quickness buff goes on.

Viking Jorun.5413:

purgatoryz.6038:

Don’t worry, with everyone doing a mad dash to P/D builds you’ll probably see less HS spam

Just from an observer perspective, I see the meta shifting from conditions to high-removal mobility in the near future. You should expect to see sword builds start popping up to counter the mobility/Condi meta that’s forming.

this also may be true. but only d/p thief can keep up with it fast enough. considering a thief can reaaply 6 bleeds on every 4 seconds with relative ease plus blind and poison and vulnerabilty to cover it. even d/p is beatable quite easily with the right build (duel style roaming can but not as easily since its a diff util setup). so let em change its cool with me as a condi thief…atleast for now. would love to switch to sword but havent been able to make it work in wvw yet…atleast not on a basis wher ei dont mind if a zerg does a drive by :P

Viking Jorun.5413:

Travlane.5948:

Grimwolf.7163:

Cyhann.2609:

Grimwolf.7163:

I really think that just moving us over to recharges without Initiative like everyone else would be a massive improvement for the Thief.

No, give Ini to every class, that would be an improvement. CD’s are boring, and also
just picking what is free to do stuff very easily.

And it would be an absolute balancing nightmare. We already have perma-stealth and evade-spam with Thieves. One can only imagine what nightmares other classes would inflict upon the game with similar abilities.
Necros chain-fearing everyone to their deaths, for one.

there is a reason why thief has no blocks no invl no protection no retaliation no aegis….no burning….lowest pool hp…most squishy…med armor…. umm what else am i forgetting? oh yeah their weapon skills cant really do anything to the enemy as far as KDs/Pushbacks/Pulls/Fears/Stone/freeze we do have 1 stun but its a prerequisite skill (needs stealth …TS)……

so that said…if necros had initiative system like us…the devs would have put all fear like skills on utilities only. :P not a really good comparison

Runes of Lyssa + Basilisk Venom: Problem solved. Good day.

This is how I fixed the Warrior community, but I replaced Basilisk Venom with Signet of Rage (cooldown reduced).

wow 5 secs. …. if they upped this to 10 secs like they did signet might (5 stacks per for 10 secs) then i would say yeah def use this. but runes of lyssa have way less production than say power runes…..or 45% bleed runes…..or 50% endurance rune with withdraw…. few theives run lyssa but thats not a class mechanic. anyone can run it. we were talking about str8 up class specifics. thieves dont have anything attached to their weapons that really control like what i mentioned above bc of initiative. and to compare a necro who does is just a bad comparison. if a necro had init they wouldnt have fear etc on regular attacks….only on utilz.

purgatoryz.6038:

We already are viable in zergs with D/D + SB condition. P/D #1 needs work but at it’s core it’s a single target weapon set. Gotta adapt a bit.

SB is only zerg tool we have unless we main hand pistol and dole out ricochets which does work i will say. caltrops and daggerstorm with ports makes it more worth while too. sb only in a zerk build i dont like it in a condi build. but also if u compare using SB IN the battle itself to any other class…we dont come close to the output/help/support that another class can do. even ranger can do better so :P right now we kinda just blow in zerg style. SB and p/d can atleast get in there and do work…. but if i had to do a 50 v 50 i would only draft 1 thief for my zerg maybe 2 for venom share.

ok to keep it in perspective if i had a 50 v 50 this is how i would set it up. im sure all of you would do differently but as far as a thief fitting in im sure its kinda close

7 Necros (Conditions/marks/fears/high hp from elite etc)
7 Guardians (running Staff/GS/Hammer mixes)
6 Mesmers (obvious builds here)
10 Warriors (6 hammer builds 4 GS builds)
9 Elementalists (4 running heal/cleanse 5 AOE dmg)
4 Engineers(aoe with supply elite)
4 Rangers(Aoe and pets absord dmg nicely so others dont)
3 Thieves(full venom share SB and P/D)

my guild has done 50 v 50’s before. most of which we never have a man downed. or alot of which we never have a man even downed. we have some on video in BP website somewhere among the many.

anyway point being you see where thieves do have a small niche. other classes CAN run other builds but thief is stuck with venom share. if u said….trav change those thieves to a diff build…i would delete them from the lineup and add something else in rather than them. lets put it that way. so thief really does need some zerg buffing abilities. dont have to be as good as others but SB is slow and short ranged…..so kidna limiting….

Grimwolf.7163:

Cyhann.2609:

Grimwolf.7163:

I really think that just moving us over to recharges without Initiative like everyone else would be a massive improvement for the Thief.

No, give Ini to every class, that would be an improvement. CD’s are boring, and also
just picking what is free to do stuff very easily.

And it would be an absolute balancing nightmare. We already have perma-stealth and evade-spam with Thieves. One can only imagine what nightmares other classes would inflict upon the game with similar abilities.
Necros chain-fearing everyone to their deaths, for one.

there is a reason why thief has no blocks no invl no protection no retaliation no aegis….no burning….lowest pool hp…most squishy…med armor…. umm what else am i forgetting? oh yeah their weapon skills cant really do anything to the enemy as far as KDs/Pushbacks/Pulls/Fears/Stone/freeze we do have 1 stun but its a prerequisite skill (needs stealth …TS)……

so that said…if necros had initiative system like us…the devs would have put all fear like skills on utilities only. :P not a really good comparison

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Travlane.5948:

really dont think it can be done in 7-8 seconds ? :P

It seems that you got lost in the conversation. Your video further support my skepticism to your claim.

I said;
“It’s hard to believe that to be a duel since whoever you are dueling didn’t even try to defend themselves. :/”

Then you post a video beating up on a golem…. >.<’

well sorry i didnt have a video of THAT duel. but even if its 1 in 100 u dont think thats likely? ok ill do a few duels tnite. ill def do it to 1 person. wanna make a bet in gold that you will renig on?

@obscure if u played gw1 and gw2 then you should never havve written any of these posts. did u ever play gw1?

@Bacon
@EXCALIBUR

u know i think u 2 are onto something. buff pistol auto attack 50% dmg and riocochet 80% or 100% would be great. it would make us a viable player in zergs! we can range and not have to die in 1 sec great idea!

Obscure One.4357:

Travlane.5948:

panicbutton.1053:

Again, you’re asking for a change to the mechanics of the class. What makes us different is that we CAN spam one skill if we want — despite how inefficient it is. It’s inefficiency should be enough to make you think smarter… You’re not even noting other builds that we are capable of running besides d/d heartseekers.

Look, we have already discussed how useless spamming heartseeker is in a real fight. Now you’re requesting that we make it even worse if we chain the same moves? We are the only class that can chain the same moves over and over, your suggestion for exhaustion only targets thieves. The sole motive of making people “think” more is not enough to establish this, YOUR motive should be that spamming heartseeker will not kill anyone besides the person that JUST got into pvp/wvw.

exactly correct. Its like telling a guardian not to wear toughness/heal armor and to think more creatively. if u wanna wear that kind of armor you are going to move at a -15% speed deduction. lol. will it promote more skillful guardians design? yes! is it warranted? i dont think i should have to answer that.

where will he stop with this. you are targeting unskillful players i understand that. but its no different than saying to a cookie cutter user that you will have a debuff if you decide to copy a nubby META of FOTM build. 90% of the players in the game are really not skillful.

your idea….if you look at it in an economical sense…..is a horrible idea. and let me be the first to tell you…when you present and idea…always consider the economical ramifications first because not only are they an important factor….they are the MOST important factor.

will this make more people angry than not?
how will this affect incoming revenue?
will this discourage bad players from paying/playing more?
will it affect the overall game in a negative way?
is it warranted?
is it popular belief it should be this way?
how can i turn this idea into money?

they have questions like this when they implement new ideas. of course balancing is key too b ut that falls under the games perspective from players and how we will view and react to it.

I presented this suggestion for the specific purpose of gleaning other rational opinions. The loudest response thus far has been, “kitten and learn to play” which is not only irrelevant to the point, but not furthering a rational dialog in regard to an actual issue.

I can completely except rational reasons for an error in my thinking, as a select few have pointed out, since as I noted in my initial post I am no expert in all things thief. Counter points should include ways to resolve the issue which off the top of my head would span from adding build diversity, to initiative pool benefits to discourage draining it with unskilled spam. Exhaustion is just a singular idea targeting a root problem, and resolving the root problem is the intention, not furthering an idea that may in fact do more harm than good, despite its intention.

yes but your root problem is idiots and ignoramuses. problem is for you that they also have money and are paying players and also the majority of players within gw2. this means that there is no reason for gw2 team to irritate them. thief mesmer and ele are the hardest classes to play bc they have the most options and versatility. other classes are stronger at their specialties but easier to play. i understand where you are comign from but the suggested idea breaks the foundation of the class. would be like giving rangers a 150 range bow attacks. it just wouldnt work and they wont kill anything. your problem is one of irritation ….. bc even these dum dums that play like that? they are a gift. accept it…down them…collect their bags

Master of Timespace.2548:

Drtrider.6314:

It’s bad enough it’s the weakest profession in the game right now, the last thing we need is to add cool-downs on skills.

Now that’s just some worst bull kitten I have seen in a while in these forums.
Anyway, I wouldn’t even care if they’d add that mechanic suggested by OP. Would it even affect anything else but might stacking short bow thieves, and perhaps slightly reduce the stealth effectivity of a d/p thief? Oh and sword dagger yes.

in short it will kill the thief class.

D/d, p/d and d/p would all still be effective though. Underwater thief and p/p are useless anyway.

ok few things here :P

1) thief is one of the worst…not THE worst but id say 2nd worst behind ranger. why?
well this is bc u ahve to look at what the game is about. WVW SPVP TPVP PVE and DUNGEONS. we are obviously on the last 2 in dungeons/pve without really much arguable there. spvp and tpvp we arent run as much bc well most our builds are crap bc stealth isnt made for that style fighting as we always lose the node. this leaves us with fragile sword builds which are good at taking bunkers but when it gets really hairy i always target thieves first bc they down the fastest which means its now 5 v 4 instead of 5 v 5. WVW we have 2 roles. scouting and blast finishers pre battle. during battle we can stay back and SB it sure but anything we do other than scout/blast finish is doen better by everyone else. 1v1? srry its not part of gw2 …yet. so that leaves us right next to rangers in the bottom 2.

2) it WOULD ruin our class . D/D? forget about HS ….. D/P? forget about 5 2 2 2 or 3 3. P/D? this one might survive that depending on the definition time of “spamming” if its 3 secs or under its prolly fine. S/x? yup all ruined 2 2 3 3 3 2 2 . SB? prolly the worst. there is only one direct dmg skill. so what would u do ? 2 then 4 then 3 then 1 1 then 2? you woould NEVER kill anyone with sb …EVER lol. maybe a lvl 1 upscale. so yeah its a class ruining idea

what build are you running with?

i use 15% bc i use sleight of hand…… so i get a 2 sec stun

or use doom bc it really helps when they are about to heal

50% energy i run on mine with the 15% paralyzer. works great. a thief can never have too much energy.

@drtrider

never spam 1 thru 5 around you. if you dodge roll 1 u dodge roll them all then ur out of 1-5 for nothing. do them close enough so but not too close where you can onlyh dodge roll one at a time! then you run around them until the thief triggers them. dodge roll yourself.

you can also do engie style and run in a straight line while casting them to your rear if the theif wants the kill he will have to pay for it.

Bacon.4918:

Pistol/Pistol and Pistol/Dagger are both underwhelming sets. P/D is weak at best and is more of a spec to run if you never want to die. If body shot was made into a burning shot instead P/D might be viable.

p/d is very viable :P….zerg and 1 v 1 anyway if u need help seeing why msg me in game ! we can test it against all 7 other classes. only 2 of them have a chance. anyway hit me up sometime ill put it on video.

panicbutton.1053:

Again, you’re asking for a change to the mechanics of the class. What makes us different is that we CAN spam one skill if we want — despite how inefficient it is. It’s inefficiency should be enough to make you think smarter… You’re not even noting other builds that we are capable of running besides d/d heartseekers.

Look, we have already discussed how useless spamming heartseeker is in a real fight. Now you’re requesting that we make it even worse if we chain the same moves? We are the only class that can chain the same moves over and over, your suggestion for exhaustion only targets thieves. The sole motive of making people “think” more is not enough to establish this, YOUR motive should be that spamming heartseeker will not kill anyone besides the person that JUST got into pvp/wvw.

exactly correct. Its like telling a guardian not to wear toughness/heal armor and to think more creatively. if u wanna wear that kind of armor you are going to move at a -15% speed deduction. lol. will it promote more skillful guardians design? yes! is it warranted? i dont think i should have to answer that.

where will he stop with this. you are targeting unskillful players i understand that. but its no different than saying to a cookie cutter user that you will have a debuff if you decide to copy a nubby META of FOTM build. 90% of the players in the game are really not skillful.

your idea….if you look at it in an economical sense…..is a horrible idea. and let me be the first to tell you…when you present and idea…always consider the economical ramifications first because not only are they an important factor….they are the MOST important factor.

will this make more people angry than not?
how will this affect incoming revenue?
will this discourage bad players from paying/playing more?
will it affect the overall game in a negative way?
is it warranted?
is it popular belief it should be this way?
how can i turn this idea into money?

they have questions like this when they implement new ideas. of course balancing is key too b ut that falls under the games perspective from players and how we will view and react to it.

yeah getting the base thakittens still not making a huge difference in any builds. i only use this combo in duels against guards/rangers/warriors bc they have to hoof it a lil more than the rest of the classes so its not a setup for all or roaming. more of a dueling specialty.

i was only able to pull off this successfully once against a warrior without having 1 miss. so its not exactly common to say the least. and without a combo like this i dont find torment to be any huge contribution to this build.

i find that the normal way to incorporate it is to just use it as a gap creator when you have too much melee pressure.

basically this : CND —→ Sneak Attack --→ Shadow Strike —→ Steal
--→Shadow strike —→Blinding Powder --→Sneak attack

this applies:
10 bleed stacks
4 Torment stacks
1 Stun 2 secs
1 poison stack
3 Vulnerability stacks
2 Blind Stacks

this is a more common combo that actually happens way more often and it wont have torment/bleeds come off first unless of course timing might mess you up. sometimes i stack on a cripple/blind to protect it.

i peronsally lose to them when i have lag :P

@bobross

LOL! is that really a new “spam”

@ GRIMWOLF

go on guardian. take away his cooldowns. lol !!!

now have him in a fight but let him use his 5 skill on GS> it misses. let him use it again.

now he cant use any skills for the next 4-5 seconds as he needs to recharge. good night guardian!

the guardians efficacy is now cut 75%. if u wanna compare to another class ….itll always look like this.

the best case to explain it is ele. imagine them not being able to use ANY skills for 5 secs after using 2 in a row. AHAHHAHAHAH dead ele everytime!

this is thief specific. its made this way to promote versatility to circumstance and also bc we are squishy and lowest hp pool in game.

any nub can get on a guardian and get the right armor and be a better guardian than a thief could be a good thief. there are easy classes. thief is not even in the easiest 3-4.

Grimwolf.7163:

Obscure One.4357:

The subject line says it all.

I’m pretty much fed up with a class design allowing those who pick up the Thief class to spend less than a day with it and compete with some of the best DPS metagamers to ever put their hands on GW2…by pressing 2…a lot.

Now before you crazed defenders of all things Thief get all up in arms over another thread calling for a nerf, please read, let this idea bounce around in your head a bit, and then reply with an actual opinion.

Are you ready?

Are you sure?

Ok, here it is:

New sPvP and WvW Feature: Exhaustion “when activating the same non-auto-attack (#1 skill) weapon skill within 2 seconds that skill gains a 1.5 second cooldown that stacks in intensity.”

As far as I can tell this only effects skill spamming and doesn’t circumvent the initiative system, but rather encourages learning to play the class as intended. Pressing one key to victory is pandering to bad players and trivializing the class as a whole. Watching an initiative bar and playing Wack-A-Mole with the 2-key should not be the back bone of a play-style.

My biggest problem doesn’t stem from being attacked by this type of play style, oh no. I beat those kids like it’s a Chris Brown and Rihanna RP. The problem is my difficulty in learning the class. Everytime I try to get into it, I get myself into a situation in which repetitively pressing 2 is the best choice (cloak & dagger, backstab, they run…soooo heartseeker…still alive, still running, sooooo heartseeker…still not down? still running…heartseeker!) Other classes, of with I have 4 fully exoticed at 80, I’m forced to use something else, because the skill I’d like to use is on cool-down, so I have to figure out what to do with my other options. This is how I learn, and this prevents me from playing a non-2-spamming thief. I burn out my initiative pressing 2 and if it doesn’t kill them I stealth away and recover…and then try something else only to end up doing it again, which actually beats other thieves more often than anyone else, which is dumb, since I’ve collectively put in about 10 hours of game time into the class and only in sPvP.

That would be a straight up Thief-only nerf. And initiative only exists to allow the same ability to be used consecutively, making initiative nothing but pure downsides without any benefit.
A better suggestion would be to just scrap initiative and give us recharges like everyone else. I could get behind that.
Despite whatever they may have intended initiative for, all it does now is allow bad players to perform well at the expense of overall performance and ability to balance.
It’d have the extra benefit of completely squashing perma-stealth and remove the need for Revealed, which breaks certain traits.

well idk about ALL that but some i agree with. i don think it allows bad players to be good. but i will say that it makes them seem more agressive. i would much rather fight a spammer anyday. i think any thief here will agree. if u wanna spam plz do.

Viking Jorun.5413:

purgatoryz.6038:

Don’t worry, with everyone doing a mad dash to P/D builds you’ll probably see less HS spam

Just from an observer perspective, I see the meta shifting from conditions to high-removal mobility in the near future. You should expect to see sword builds start popping up to counter the mobility/Condi meta that’s forming.

i remember you saying “the only thing condition like about my build was the carrion armor” ….do you still stand by that? i mean i even see the exact same traitline setup in several posts now. if not its only 10 traits off.

also explain what you mean by how sword is going to counter this? d/p has a slightly better chance with condi removal.

Bull Zooker.1672:

Travlane.5948:

lets drop the hypotheticals and look at what it is.

aint happening. if u dodge 2 of these you will have 85% hp and the thief 0 init.

this is a l2p issue.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIv0lboqzZg

except when one jumps you mid fight, you have 0 dodges and 50-60% hp after having a good fun fight with someone. then out of the blue you get jumped by a burst thief using nothing but heart seeker annd your previously fun fight is now a rather frustrating ‘I just got owned by a noob cos heart seeker is too powerful even when used by someone with no idea what theyre doing’ moment. (I dont think heart serker is OP but I think high damaging skills need to have some sort of cool down to separate them or a minimal level of skill to land, heart seeker has non of those things)

heart seeker spam literally makes me cringe.

as a result I try to avoid using it at all costs on my thief.

so what is wrong with this? you know how many times i caught eviserate to the face when i was at 40% after killing somebody? this is a case of kitten happens bro. not a OP issue. lol cmon. would u say the same if you had 5%? no of course not. its a circumstantial thing. would u say the same if u had 90%? no of course not. cmon now this is just silly

Topher.1684:

Viking Jorun.5413:

To everyone: He isn’t suggesting a change to heartseeker. The skill works as intended on its own. The issue, and I’m sure a lot of you have experienced this, is that tapping skill 2 in quick succession results in more than 1 attack when in the heat of a fight, wasting both your initiative and resulting in accusations of a lack of skill. Exhaustion would need a lot of work to only limit the spamability of heartseeker in combat (since it’s frequently used to cross large distances out of combat).

Unless I missed something in his post (very possible) he is suggesting a change to HS, and every other spammed ability. He wants players who purposefully press 2 more then once or twice to be penalized.

I agree that in combat I have pressed 2 and had HS go off twice (first one killed the target, then I HS in some random direction wasting initiative), and this is annoying, but this is not what the OP I talking about (I apologize if it is, but your subsequent posts in this thread suggest otherwise). Anet has already done something similar to your last point about in combat/out of combat with elementalist RtL (ride the lightning), which nerfed their ability to move around out of combat (of getting out of combat) into the ground kinda. So even if anet took this suggestion and deployed it, I doubt they would let us keep it’s spam-ability out of combat.

why wouldnt they let us keep it? its barely 25% as effective as a warriors skill sprinting/leaping/whirling away. if u took 10 seconds to HS HS HS as manhy times as you possible can and a warrior did all his skills to sprint leap etc far as fast as he can. a thief would prollyh cover 35% of the total ground the warrior did. not even a comparison. so if they did that to thief do u think they would do it to warriors? it WOULD be fair

PS: the reason they did this to eles is bc it COULD get u out of combat almost assuredly everytime….it was a different animal in the way it acted.

@obscured.

SCENARIO:

opponent is at 48% HP(lets say 8.75k) and has a heal skill available in 8 seconds.
thief is at 70% (9k) hp. low defense obv too. 8 initiative left.
thief just used a critical hit HS and and now opponent is at 32% hp. 6 init left (1 was regen from 5).
now the thief uses ANOTHER critical hit (best case scenario 2 crits in a row lol) HS again and now he has 3 init left( about to be 4 soon)
now the enemy is at 16% HP (2.9k). Heartseeker is now exhausted and his opponents heal is 3 seconds from being available.
so with the d/d build he has…. he has 3 choices:
skill 3 deathblossom
skill 4 dancing daggers
skill 5 Cloack and Dagger
or just plain auto attack

3/4 of these skills are melee range and without steal ready u have no way of getting close if hes running.
Skill 4 is LOW dmg and has no chance of finishing this guy off.
you are 2.66 seconds from getting 2 more initiative for CND
most non thief builds run swiftness for a reason (less mobility than thief)….
what should a thief do here that is the best option.

now picture that the thief had to work really hard to get this guy under 50% hp in the first place. dodges this dodges that…blocks….hurts the thief into healing up….he himself heals up. alot has happened. its been a very good fight. the thief capitalizes on a mistake and manages to get him under 50%. his eyes light up seeing that he is about to be deaths doorstep. SEEK THE HEART and finish this fight….hence the name heartseeker. the lower the hp the more violent the thief gets. vicious.

now we know as i showed you in the video spamming HS gets an opponent to half at best. usually much less and then u have 0 init and are a standing dummy to be killed.

how does taking away a skill when its earned/ready or making it exhausted by letting it be used less in a perfect scenario make somebody player more skillfully?

cmon this is silly nonsense man. yes some thieves go 2 2 2 2 or 3 3 3 3 or 5 2 2 2 1 or 5 1 5 1 5 1. but its by choice and by fight. its made to be like this bc not every instance/scenario is the same and that gives the thief versatility ! horrible idea and im just trying to help exlplain why.

warriors have like 6 ways of leaping/whirling and already are uncatchable in a foot race. this would just kill thief mobility even more out of combat. the skill part of thief is choosing when and if to spam something.

examples:

3 3 3 on s/x against a guardian/ele (gets rid of boons and makes them in a world of trouble)

2 2 2 against a target under 50% hp (if you even have the energy left

3 3 3 PW a mob of hostiles in PVE

x x x against a boss (any build depending on boss)

4 4 4 dancing dagger for multiple tags/cripples

2 2 s/x to immob an enemy on a 2 v 1 so they cant get away

3 3 3 d/p on a fleeing mob that is low on HP but using blocks/aegis etc

2 2 2 SB on AOE mobs for tags/dmg and bleeds

occaisonally and i mean only occaisonally is it smart to spam. we are made to do this bc its how our class is build. we can use 2 skills like CND and have to wait a FULL 16 SECONDS to get full again….. so it does come at a disadvantage too! what? HS HS HS HS? if u dodge roll at the very last second of 1 you actually can dodge two of them if they are spamming….then they waste 50% of a full init bar on nothing and are in a world of trouble in that case. so why limit it? i could see if we had 50% faster init regen as base but its fine. no point in changing anything. theres no need/warrant.

yeap. those stuns are tough when they hit. only bad side is PW does leave u vulnerable at the very beginning and end. so be careful.

ahh ok. wish they came with condi stats :P prec and condi dont go together. i never understood why anet did that

great so its settled. the skill isnt broken or OP so its good as is

ahh giver weapons!….

by the way im almost positive you only get 10% total even if u have 2 weapons. i could be totally wrong but i thought thats the way it worked. same with sigils.

use shadow strike on melee builds then auto attack and wait til they get close again. works amazingly well on melee rangers/guardians/warriors

Obscure One.4357:

Travlane.5948:

see video above. HeartSeeker is not broken or Overpowering.

see original post. I did not use the term “Broken” as it functions as intended. I did not use the term “Overpowering” as the skill alone is balanced. You lack both understanding and context.

Hype.8032:

Maybe I’m off base here but it feels like the phrase, “u mad cuz u bad” applies here.

Your proposed nerf is ridiculous and unmerited.

Ridiculous and unmerited would describe the ability to not only play a class, but excel at doing so in a game armed with only the experience of fighting against them. I know the limits of 2-spamming thieves fairly well, and I see the problem is inherent to the class design encouraging unskilled game play.

Perhaps skilled game-play based on knowledge and experience is something you disapprove of?

perhaps you lack understanding :P you said urself its not broken or OP….why change it. why not make it cost less initiative then lol. why destroy something thats fine??? i mean really

doing CND spaming everytime you exit stealth SHOULDNT be enough to kill anyone….just annoy the crap out of bad players.

the only reaosn i say bad players is bc all u have to do is dodge every 5 secs

Obscure One.4357:

Viking Jorun.5413:

This would nerf a lot more viable builds than it would help to decrease heartseeker spamming. Condition D/D thieves who use death blossom (their only source of bleed aside from caltrops), the infamous cripspam s/d thieves, boon strip s/d thieves and s/p control thieves would all suffer.

I do think that they need to increase the after cast on heartseeker, because as of now it’s already a pretty spammy move even when you don’t intend on hitting it more than once.

Queue for intelligent response in thief forums: ~2 hours

I suppose I wouldn’t know much in regard to those builds, though I am familiar with PvE viability, I haven’t had enough time with the class to try out anything else (nor been encouraged to do so as inflicting down state is my favorite condition). What about limiting exhaustion to non-auto-attack skills that are combo finishers or a stacking 10% reduction in damage (max -30%) in place of the cool down? I’m not sure the aftercast would be all to great as this impedes mobility, and I know if I can’t stick and move I’m going to get melted (especially against Mesmers, how thieves even fight them is flat out beyond me).

see video above. HeartSeeker is not broken or Overpowering.

how do you get 75% ….ii know 40 comes from food…..10 from rune perhaps…..10 from mug…..so usually 50 % with the 15 15 15 rune setup. 60 if i drop runes . i cant add more into DA line. it kills build.

Fade.7658:

Travlane.5948:

@sir vincent …ok than.

lemme ask u this….is it possible to …as a thief…stack 7 or 9 stacks of torment on somebody?

You can get 7 stacks fairly easily, of Torment. Pop Skale Venom, Shadow Strike, Steal, Shadow strike again. If you have Infiltrator’s Signet up, you can again teleport to your target and Shadow Strike for the 9th stack. You’ll definitely need at least 75% condition duration, and you won’t have 9 stacks for long as they start to drop off.

Residual Venoms would add 1 more stack, if traited for it.

wow why didnt i think residual venoms! too bad they wont affect shadow strike. i think venoms should add 1 stck of every condi for the next 10 seconds. this stacks stuff is a horrible setup

How is torment working for you guys. i have personally only found it usefull rarely in wvw and quite well in dueling. other than that im still iffy on it. i found a few good combos to get it up to 9 stacks sometimes 11 if situation is right but doesnt happen all the time. i actually dropped a guy in wvw with this combo although i used steal to stun (2 secs) his heal so thats prolly why he had no chance…and dodge rolls didnt help eeither…atleast not in that particular time.

would love to hear how u guys are using it but heres on example how iw as in a duel:

animal i know what u mean. but 1/4 sec daze is only good for a quick rupt…although there is a cooldown on a rupted skill tho so

lets drop the hypotheticals and look at what it is.

aint happening. if u dodge 2 of these you will have 85% hp and the thief 0 init.

this is a l2p issue.

@OBSCURE ONE….would u like me to show you a video of 2 …that way i dont hve to call u a liar :P? or just rediculous. what class are you and what armor set?

if u can dodge roll 2 x theres no way a thief can even get u under half. dont care even if ur full zerker. sorry man u r way off base here. besides this is another THIEF ONLY nerf. wont affect other classes. just thieves…thieves are weakest class if not 2nd weakest class overall out there. dare i say the cliche “L2P” ?

unreasonable? what do u mean

1 sec. only 2 secs if u have mesmer runes or 15% on sigil. they round up to the nearest whole second.

ok here i made this just now as an example. not the fastest time but its also in SPVP.

Imagine 25 stacks of bloodlust and food in wvw etc.

this is a difference 1275 condition dmg vs 1800-1900 in wvw. really dont think it can be done in 7-8 seconds ? :P

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Travlane.5948:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Viking Jorun.5413:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Viking Jorun.5413:

Not true. Condition duration also benefits from traits that go something like, “+10% damage against bleeding foes”.

Bleed is so easy to apply that even with 0% condition duration, you can still take advantage of that bonus in damage.

Again, if the condition deals damage, you want it shorter duration but potent.

You don’t have to sacrifice one to get the other, though.

It’s not sacrificing if you don’t pick it up in the first place. If you are using raw damage with S/D, sure you want Condition Duration so that your Vulnerability will last longer. But if you are Condition Damage build with P/x…building Condition Duration is a waste. The +25% Condition duration from DA should be enough.

Travlane.5948:

dont you think that higher duration = more time invis while conditions do dmg.

build 1 (condition dmg no duration) CND sneak attack….. CND sneak attack

build 2(condition dmg and duration) CND sneak attack CND CND CND sneak attack

so to speak

It can also mean that if you don’t end the fight sooner, you are risking a chance that their skills will go out of CD and finish you off instead.

I admit, it makes me giggle seeing all the numbers like fountain off their head, but the longer the fight is, the worst it may turn out on you.

most duels i rarely end up using more than 2 utilities. trying to go to fast with condi can leave you without an ace up your sleeve too tho. idk the traits i saw him on dont really help that much and the power doesnt help the direct dmg too much either.

Having an ace up your sleeve implies that you have to cheat in order to win. What I am showing you is, if done correctly, there’s no need for the ace because it all comes down to tactics.

tehcnically having an ace DOES mean cheat. what im referring to is a last second save that is in a win lose scenario. blinding powder is a great instance. instant cast. blinds…invises….heals….drops condis.

@sir vincent …ok than.

lemme ask u this….is it possible to …as a thief…stack 7 or 9 stacks of torment on somebody?