Guild Wars 2

Bsgapollo.5364:

What ? Then what would be the purpose to hide behind objects. Not even 1 skill in the game can do this, why should we even start with it now?

A few necro skills can target people through walls. I’m not an advocate for staff getting one of these abilities, I’m just pointing out that there are skills which don’t need LoS.

In all seriousness, I think or settled on a build (pay no attention to the boon duration…..)
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fEAQJAoYhEmgbyx5wjDAkHuADLiCYUekDN2A-jUDBYMChUDIUIAUBgZPFRjtMMaVXBp8Ks6FY6SK1qTByfAwpgRrWEAzYA-w

This is why I run S/P and excel at it. You’ve got to distinguish yourself somehow, because 99% of people will judge you before the match starts.

TeamBattleAxe.3901:

No stealth P/P. We don’t have any condition removal like those sissy sword thieves use.

You also waste initiative and have no cleave, and positioning doesn’t matter as much!

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

LightningBlaze.4913:

I agree with the op on everything he stated. An additional point would be the constant steath mechanic that both thieves and mesmers abuse is completely broken and needs a fix!

Learn the difference between constant. At the VERY most Mesmer has 17seconds of stealth and for that, they lose ALOT once that stealth is gone they have no access to it for minimum another 13seconds – assuming that they take PU and they used Decoy first and that it has the trait for lower cool down. The other skills Veil and MI are both 90second cool down and Mass Invis is EASILY interrupted.

Compare that to Thief…
They have traits for stealth to last longer, traits for health regen, increased speed, initiative regen and condition removal as well as ALOT more access to stealth and can EASILY spend 70-80% of a fight in stealth.

As a stealthless thief, I really think ANet thinks stealth is a necessary part of the class. I have a hard time finding condition removal outside of food and runes, and the stealthless sustained healing trait is a joke as far as its base heal goes (and it got buffed to heal for an astonishing one more per initiative per 100healing power)

Hayashi.3416:

As a S/F PvE elementalist, very much – enough to spec 190% boon duration. But if we’re talking D/D PvP, boon duration is not a good idea. Condition duration, condition damage would do better, because having your boons nulled or stolen is Not Funny.

As someone who mains a boon strip thief I can confirm that it indeed sucks for boon duration classes to have their boons stolen. Especially your 30 seconds plus of stability during Tornado, Rampage (ranger, engie, warrior), Dagger Storm, etc.. It’s hilarious for me when playing my thief though — immune to CC while having the ability to stun lock you in your elite or after you’ve blown your utilities is amazing in the way it can turn any fight around.

Volrath.1473:

I still don’t see the need to spend 30 in trickery… I’ll give it a try when i get home but…
SA will give us access to condi remove on stealth and i don’t feel very comfortable with allot of boons since Necros are part of every team and Corrupt Boons will counter Trickery and Lyssa runes easily.

You must not PvP at all. Necros are still a joke in PvP, while they’re OP due to Dire gear in WvW. No sane team would take a necro when an Engie can do it better with better mobility and sustain.

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fYAQNAsaVlYmSO3dS6E/5Eh3jyOWzqVgmdP4q81KA-j0DBYfREREgaAiWGgQAM5pIaslhFRjVNDRVLoqkYaXQ6XwmeQ2eAGfLrWKAsFGB-w

S/P no-stealth. Nothing will teach you to respect your positioning and dodges better, and ripping 40 seconds of stability from a Rampage warrior/ranger is also hilarious.

Guys. Please. I WvW, and haven’t gotten my ascended armor or ascended ranged weapons yet, and you PvErs are killing me demanding more to do with them. Life might be fine and dandy for you all, but from a WvW standpoint I just can’t keep up. Dragonite is hard to come by, and while I have no issues with Empyrial Shards or Bloodstone Dust, the demands of the PvErs to put in more uses for these things is making it a bear to even keep those in stock.

1. S/F ele for might stacking and high AoE burst
2. Guardian as anchor
3. DPS Mesmer for Mass Invis, quick escapes with portal
4. Thief; sustained damage sword build – stun lock & chase
5. Tanky/control role, pick your poison (D/D bunker ele, Hambow regen warrior, Ham/Healway Guard, etc.)

LightningBlaze.4913:

I agree with the op on everything he stated. An additional point would be the constant steath mechanic that both thieves and mesmers abuse is completely broken and needs a fix!

Hello, I’m a thief that doesn’t use stealth. I also happen to eat stealth thieves for breakfast. Hint: only access to stability through 120-second elite, most carry only one stun break — if that. Stealth condition Mesmers are a different story, though. They’ve access to not only stealth, but clones which apply conditions even when evading, thus leaving no counter play.

Short answer: Yes.

Long answer: Yes, Steal is enough.

They fixed the after cast on PW. Now you don’t need to walk forward after the stun.

frans.8092:

Viking Jorun.5413:

Very few thieves have rigs that they can record at decent settings on, otherwise I’m positive there would be at least one more thief doing this.

Decent settings is rather vague. I can record 1080 at low – medium settings (native 1080 resolution, high lod about 30fps), on a simple i3 rig. I will not be trying 1080 in a zerg vs zerg but then, neither is Yishis.

I’ve tried livestreaming on my rig at 540p, and while the framerate never drops below 40 the video is still choppy. Maybe recording onto disk is different? I’ve only got native 720.

My rig goes as follows:

• NVidia 630 GT 1.0 GB
• Intel Core i7 3rd Gen 3632qm 2.6GHz
• 12.0GB RAM

Can play at 60fps with no issues on medium-high settings when not livestreaming, drops to 30-45 when livestreaming on medium-low settings.

Pixels.6532:

Funny to see people finding something negative to say… Yishis is a great player and great for the thief community. Very few thieves consistently post videos as informative and constructive as his.

Very few thieves have rigs that they can record at decent settings on, otherwise I’m positive there would be at least one more thief doing this.

oZii.2864:

Svarty.8019:

I’ve been pointed at this build, but I am concerned about a lack of Vitality. Could someone please explain why Vitality is not an issue when there is such high spike damage in WvW?

I am new to Guardian just dinged 80 2 days ago but Elementalist is my main and frequent the forums alot there. They both have the same base vitality but Guardian has higher armor. The main issue for spike damage is a Thief running a signets of power build full zerk. No other class should spike you fast enough where you feel you couldn’t react. Other classes can build as glassy as a Signet’s of power thief but they can’t repeat that burst nearly as often as a thief. The other class that would maybe force you to add more vit would be a 30/20/x/x/x Terrormancer and that is a maybe.

I would never roll around with 15.5k HP on my Ele in WvW but I so far don’t feel I need more then that guardian.

Thing is, that thief is also running 10k health, medium armor, no defenses except stealth, and if you hit him with a Dragon’s Tooth/Whirling Wrath on a DPS guardian/ele you’ll wind up with a dead thief shortly thereafter.

I don’t think your build was viable to begin with, to be completely honest. Any backstab build should be running Hidden Killer if they don’t already have 100% crit chance, and your distribution is all over the place. It looks more like a sword build than a dagger build, and you may as well be going 30 in Trickery for Sleight of Hand to prioritize the enemy’s stability boon.

Doggie.3184:

The changes to Assassin’s reward are meaningless. and moving it to grandmaster made it even worse. Well, we beta tested the change and it just didn’t work out for us. Time to go back to the drawing board and change it again.

and as others’ have said~ I would really love to have a condition removal trait for non-stealth builds. Or love in general for non stealth builds. On that note, I’m curious if Anet actually believes that we’re even allowed to not use stealth. Is it a requirement for every Thief build?

Interceptor.2653:

BobbyT.7192:

And I think assassin retreat works on white mobs, not able to test it atm tho

It does not. Ambient creatures don’t give you the Swiftness.

They put you in combat though if you Cloak and Dagger them, making you move slower. Which is interesting. When you kill them normally you’re not put into combat. Only if you kill them with a skill that puts you into stealth.

Only if you have Blind of Stealth. Blinding puts you in combat.

Urejt.5648:

Viking Jorun.5413:

Try slotting Scorpion Wire.

troll alert XP

How so? He can’t cap the point if he’s not on it. Use it to your advantage.

Try slotting Scorpion Wire.

Elm.8169:

snip

This is why I run no-stealth S/P. It forces you to adapt to each situation, and you have no time to develop a set rotation other than when initiating or escaping. Each animation is a tell sign for a different move. Learning everything your enemies have up their sleeves is absolutely key in winning a fight, and often people lose to the class(es) they don’t understand. Browsing their forums helps a lot as well. Necros cry about having no stun breaks and very difficult access to stability. You rip their stability when it pops and begin to stun then and interrupt their casts and the playing field tips in your favor. Warriors have lots of access to stability, but they lack instant condition removal, making Blind a huge issue for them. Dropping Black Powder and ripping their stability from Rampage or their 15-second trait/stance combo will net you a huge amount of time where you’re immune to their CC and they’re vulnerable to interrupts and attacks. Poison also mitigates the healing their signet can deal, so it’s important to have Shortbow for Choking Gas and 5 points in Deadly Arts.

Many thieves don’t utilize combo fields and finishers, either. A few seconds of stealth, even for someone primarily stealthless, can be the saving grace in a fight. Throw down Black Powder, swap to SB and put a Cluster Bomb in and you’ve got a free escape. Health low when fighting a ranger? Steal over to him, put down his water field and start spamming blast finishers while kiting his pet, applying damage and bleeding to his pet/him and healing yourself for 2k bursts. There are always little tricks like this you can use when in specific situations, but no situation is cut and dry when bringing no stealth to the table, and every move matters.

Cookamatic.4316:

Viking Jorun.5413:

Lucky for me, superior sigil of doom doesn’t have an ICD.

Is that true? Might be another build change in my future if it is.

I pray you didn’t just get my hopes up because the Building Tool doesn’t list one.

I’ve tested it multiple times in the Mists and both seem to function completely separately. The wiki doesn’t list an ICD either.

Jayden Ennok.3687:

Assassin’s reward WITH condi removal would be worth grandmaster for me. I like the idea of small heals during combat but I have to go 10pts in SA for condi removal and the heals on their own are just not worth 30pts.

Long reach is pretty good in wvw imo.

I’d be behind one condition removed per 300 or so healing. (1 condition removed per 5 initiative spent at base level)

Depends on how much I need something that moment. Right now I’m down to 15g due to the excessive cost of ascended armor, but most of the time I keep around 60g or so, sometimes upwards of 300g if I’m content with everything I have (which hasn’t been for months since ascended weapons/armor came out).

Ulion.5476:

Well to bad those sigil do not work together since all sigils shard cds.

Lucky for me, superior sigil of doom doesn’t have an ICD.

I didn’t take the time to read your post as a disclaimer. I skimmed it a bit.

These types of posts really shouldn’t exist, frankly. There are threads that discuss each of your points in the general discussion and honestly you haven’t contributed anything to the thief forums or community to the point where anyone would consider you an important loss. Not only that, but people like Jumper/Caed/Yishis/Mugi would simply put out a video and not bother with the thief forums, and only give a reason why they won’t be creating GW2-related content anymore. I’m sorry that you feel the way you do, but in all honesty you’re one of thousands that come and go each day.

Blue.1207:

Viking Jorun.5413:

Manmode is 14/14/14/14/14 no armor, triforge pendant and p/p with venomshare while solo roaming. Your argument is invalid.

Pop thieves guild followed by your venoms and you’d still win in a 1v1.

Problem is you need 30 in SA for venomshare, not 14.

Manmode is 14/14/14/14/14 no armor, triforge pendant and p/p with venomshare while solo roaming. Your argument is invalid.

I think Tripwire is generally good for point holding (until your team gets there) and on Skyhammer’s glass panels, as well as on the middle of air spaces in the WvW jumping puzzles, which I don’t really condone (It’s funny nonetheless!).

Interceptor.2653:

^ That’s a neat build. Do you really get a lot out of Infiltrator’s Signet, though? Or miss having Fury access?

42% is the optimal crit chance for a balanced build, so the fury isn’t missed at all. It’s enough to upkeep decent cleave at the very least, when not running on-crit sigils, runes, or food.
As for Infiltrator’s Signet, I don’t necessarily use it for the added initiative regen. That for the most part is managed on its own or with R4I after bursting and depleting my initiative. It’s mainly an initiator. Start from a 3,000 range away, them follow up by chaining Infiltrator’s Signet, Infiltrator’s Strike, then Steal all consecutively while having Basilisk Venom prepped and it makes for a serious ganking/chasing/scouting build. Then if you need to escape, use Withdraw, R4I and Shadowstep then proceed with the aforementioned shadowstep chaining combo to a critter or trash mob and you should be out of combat, or at the very least a 6,000 range away from your enemy.

When I’m running with the zerg, grinding WXP ranks, I swap to SoM and Dagger Storm with shortbow and shotgun cluster bombs or autoattack and poison fields on the downed, with the occasional Infiltrator’s Arrow onto a downed guardian/warrior/necro/engineer/ranger before going for the stomp if there’s time. Those mainly things any thief should be doing to contribute to a zerg fight, though.

A while back ANet said that they were going to continue adding further spec options through runes and sigils. Here’s a build that uses every damaging condition, shouldn’t be a surprise which runes/sigils it utilizes.

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fEQQJAoYlEGSuHcw5APyAA5hLwwSowBlH0MjNA-jUCBIiCh0CIk3gUHAppFRjtsuIasaZER16jY2zFRrWKAYWWB-w

I run the following build:

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fYAQNAsaVlYmSO3dS6E/5Eh3jyOWzqVgmdP4q81KA-j0DBYfREREgaAiWGgQAM5pIaslhFRjVNDRVLoqkYaXQ6XwmeQ2eAGfLrWKAsFGB-w

Regularly swap Withdraw and Signet of Malice as well as Basilisk Venom and Dagger Storm respectively between camp/group and roaming activity. Feel free to ask if you have any further questions.

Celtus.8456:

Sounds powerful, but too many variables need to line up for it to work. Needs to be 1v1, perfect positioning, enemy not cleansing or stunbreaking, need to have an area high enough to take falling damage…etc.

But you seem to consider it a joke anyway (as per the title and tone of your post). So, all that aside…great idea

Stun breaks don’t work with deep freeze, ala pre-nerf basilisk venom.

I faced an ele in a duel arena running a similar spec. I have to tell you, Deep Freeze is a MAJOR pain in a 1v1 situation since it’s essentially a much longer pre-nerf Basilisk Venom. However, if you teleport out of it when they go to use Ice Storm, you shouldn’t die to that combo. You still have to wait for the freeze to come down, but you aren’t standing in the field getting damaged to no end.

Update with a condition variant: (sorry non-asuras )

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fEQQJAoYlEGSuHcw5APyAA5hLwwSowBlH0MjNA-jUCBIiCh0CIk3gUHAppFRjtsuIasaZER16jY2zFRrWKAYWWB-w

Travlane.5948:

1v1 tournement will never tell you the best thief. if u were good udknow this

too much cheese thats why.

I have to agree with Trav here, and we never agree on anything. Any good thief is running a point assault/team build rather than a dueling build. Not any that, but some builds will always counter another build 100% of the time. The tournament then becomes “who has the best dueling build?” and no longer is a display of who is the best thief.

Hey all,

I’ve recently leveled my ele to 80 and prior to gearing any character I like to do a build critique on the forums. Now, with ele I just like the idea of being extremely mobile and tanky, something like the old D/D cantrip meta used to achieve, and I’ve come up with the build below. I’d appreciate any feedback/help on it, thanks!

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fEAQJAoYhEmkbwx5QlDIkCuw4RIMCdY5BNMD2AA-jEDBofChUDIEIAEBgJoFRjtMMsVXBp8KaKbYqXER1meDR22LrSBYiwI-w

(Yes, I realize that anyone running boon strip/rip will probably directly counter this build, but those builds are far and few, and no build has exactly 0 counters.)

EDIT: Quickly obtainable build without ascended gear. Only stat decreased is Attack by 200 due to lack of Ascended weapon attack boost.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fEAQJAoYhEmkbwx5QlDIkCuw4RIMCdY5BNMD2AA-j0CBoLChUDIEIAEBg5cFRjtMMsVXBp8Ka6FY6SER1ecFRrWKATEGB-w

roamzero.9486:

Ive never seen anyone cry how Rangers are OP in WvW. Nor have I seen people cry about Eles since they were nerfed to oblivion.

I hate rangers with their “I have to use it no matter what” longbow knockback. You’ll have a supervisor in your caltrops/AoE field and an ally ranger will come knock them out because Knockback. Nerf friendly rangers pls.

WhiteAndMilky.2514:

Step 1: Open Options
Step 2: Uncheck “Melee Attack Assist”
Step 3: Walk through the thief when he pistol whips you.

Too hard? Buy 6 melandru runes and walk around doing whatever you want.

Pwhip thieves should never kill anyone unless they outnumber you. It’s a super troll pony cheese build with little to no utility. Easy counter.

Pistol whip thief doesn’t exist. Sword/Pistol thieves, however, do. If you’re an S/P thief using Pistol Whip as your primary source of damage, you’re absolutely right. They’ll never kill anyone. However please do not confuse these bad players with S/P thieves who actually know how to use the tools they’ve chosen to wield. Pistol Whip is a utility, not a reliable direct damage source.

Josh Davis.6015:

We’d like to incorporate guilds into the ladder/season system when we come out with it later this year, but nothing is very concrete yet. Personally, I think it would be awesome to look at the ladders and see guilds listed rather than individual players. That said, this could pose issues for more casual players who like to ‘team hop’ or pug about.

I’m probably opening myself up to some interesting suggestions, but imagine you’re in-charge of creating the ladder/season system. How would you design it? What types of rewards would you include for each ‘division’ on the ladder?

Note: I’m talking about futures seasons/ladders, not the current system.

Mega Secret New Years Update go?

Warrior longbow has a 10 point adept trait which makes its attacks have 100% finisher chance, even on their skill 2 which normally isn’t a finisher at all, and also on their autoattack which has 2 projectiles.

Fantastic idea. +1

Gwalchgwn.1659:

I see you took the OP trait-build: 0/0/0/0/0 … I hope you don’t get us nerfed even more with this build!

It’s not quite as OP as 14/14/14/14/14, so I think we should be safe.

tweeve.3782:

Viking Jorun.5413:

Let me know when you see a dev thief!

Seen one

He joined us for a bit when we were playing the extra life stuff.

Pics or it didn’t happen!
O:

RedSpectrum.1975:

I’m just going to leave this here.

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Dervish

Just popping in to comment on a portion of your book of a rant, Pistol Whip is not the primary damage source of s/p. Autoattack does more damage and maintains permanent weakness and crippled. Pistol whip is there to force your enemy to stop movement completely, interrupt highly telegraphed moves, and cause them to waste stun breakers. It’s more of a utility than a straight damage source.

Zanshin.5379:

Let me know if you see a dev playing guardian.
They always seem so bored in their videos when they talk about the guardian.

It’s better than laughing at the thought of cleric thieves when saying how viable the new healing skill is and how great it scales with healing power.

JETWING.2759:

Zacchary.6183:

JETWING.2759:

Thieves with rifle?
Ridiculous!
Completli out of Thief theme :/

So is everything else. Don’t forget we DO NOT have a 1200 range option. Rifle sounds better than Longbow anyway.

Let me see…
shadow pursuit = 10 000
shadowstep = 1200
steal = 1500
some skills have 900, but thieves blinks all time. This class just get close at speed of light.

Chaining shadowsteps to travel a 4.2k distance to an opponent with Basilisk Venom and the immobilize from infiltrators step, it’s pretty funny watching said enemy freak out (and possibly need a change of pants). That being said, we still don’t have a reliable 1200 range option. World bosses = me standing 6 meters in front of everyone else getting focused out of the safety of the zerg.

This is a very, very old build. You should be running Signet of Malice though, since your caltrops and Death Blossom tick SoM each hit per opponent, leading to some very easy bunkering. Rune of the Undead also compensates for your lack of condition damage with the settler amulet, and 0/0/30/20/20 is fine. You don’t need to inflict poison on steal when you have it on autoattack – which is what you’ll be using in between death blossoms and stealth.

Eloquence.5207:

None. I have mastered the art of L2P.

Every build has a counter, even if you can generally beat it. This thread is just asking which builds get your heart beating when fighting them. Arrogance shows how little you know.