Guild Wars 2

survivability for thief is directly proportional to your build and skill at actively avoiding damage.

D/D-deathblossom

x/P-blinding powder

are the generally accepted PVE solo weapon sets. shortbow for kiting/large groups.

some people like dagger mainhand for more damage, others like sword for its ability to hit more then one target per swing.

i think elemental dagger/dagger is still a good build for them, but im fuzzy beyond that.

for WvW thieves are relegated to roaming, no direct siege participation now that shortbows range was nerfed.

fractals, i hear shortbow or p/p in your second slot, first slot varies, x/p is weaker here since many enemies and i believe all bosses are immune to blinds.

S/D with 30 points in trickery is widely considered a good fractal choice. can hit multiple targets, multiple forms of evade/get away abilities, and its ability to strip boons combined with trickeries boon stripping and boon granting is decent support too.

deathblossom i think will do good damage in fractals as well.

there is also the stealth support one…but im fuzzy on that one sorry.

hope this helped

the range nerf was for shortbows themselves, not just ours…so i think its less to do with thieves, and more to do with its comparison to longbows.

that said, still sucks, and forces thieves more towards the already loathed high damage builds.

you necro your own thread from almost a month ago to gloat over 1 extra ini point worth of cost?

petty doesnt even come close…, either way your cluttering this forum with uselessness, reported.

i admit that was when i was in the mists..so i dunno invizible

either way, math dictates 21.5 makes no sense, so either change the math, or change the CD Anet please

it still says 17.5 and gives 21.5, far as i know thats been all day. annoying, and hope its fixed, still will probably do a steal focused build tho with condition damage.

while im sure its not mandatory, but man, it certainly feels good in certain aspects of play. especially with teams (obviously).

fav thing is to steal from a mesmer and get OH SO MANY BOONS OMG

i have little info for necros, but id definitly say give it at least 2 weeks to a mont for any change to be gauged remotely accurately.

many things can be considered OP by some class/person are easy to get around by another class/person.

its why thieves get so much complaints for a long time but still sucked in organized group play.

for mesmer, id take inerrupt build over many things they used to be able to do.

kiting is annoying, being unable to kite is annoying, condition damage is annoying, removing my conditions is annoying, etc.

the blind change is pretty nice i noticed…

id almost say Deathblossom for situations where you want to stay in one spot for a whiel, D/P for group utility with good damage.

either way 30 points in trickery seems almost mandatory nowadays. at least for me, i love being able to steal a lot and have it provide lots of benefits.

wow i saw mesmers get a huge nerf to there phantasms.

thieves, have 3 things going for tem, blind with D/P cuz of the blind change

30 points in trickery for 21 SEC steal CD with a great amount of boonage

and double dagger deathblossom builds were buffed slightly as they can easily go 30 points in trickery and deathblossom ini was reduced

this imo makes for some buffs to spvp and roaming (when shown in a vacuum, we will see when in comparison to everyone else)

now the bad, thieves shortbow reduced to 900. this means that a thief is USELESS in a WvW siege/defense. they are exclusively roamers now.

necromancers have been the laughing stock of this game, id wait and see how it develops more, at the moment, its predominantly because people dont know how to deal with them.

anyone have any good ones?

my first instinct was the path of least resistance. trickery increases condition damage, so go with a condition build.

two ways would be pistol/dagger or dagger/dagger death blossom.

i enjoy melee so am inclined towards dagger/dagger, even moreso now that they lowered its ini cost.

10/0/0/30/30

Mug-no brainer with such a steal focus

acrobatics-im somewhat unsure of, typically a build like this is ini intensive, so its a balancing act between having enough initiative and too much/not enough. not enough you die, too much is wasteful.

trickery-no brainer, the main boon ones and then the steal recharge one at the end.

gear-dagger/dagger with energy/leeching is my immediate instinct as you should weave your dodges in with your deathblossoms. and more healthstealing is welcome.

second weapon set either shortbow or dagger/dagger again (tho some mention can be made for sword/dagger i think) i tend to favor another energy as i dont like running out of movement options.

gear…undead seemed teh best, i love the 5% toughness to condition damage

shaman amulet.

for skills

signet of malice

caltrops

skale venom to see of torment is worth it in a condition build.

signet of agility is nice if your with groups, as you would have little ways to deal with conditions lest yout ake pain response, and even then, only certain ones. or you could either forgo the last 10 in acrobatics, or drop mug, go into shadow arts and use stealth to help remove conditions…but that will be reliant on CnD mainly.

sorry for the rough draft may be hard to read, been a while since i played, this is where my instincts led me. any other thoughts appreciated!

i very much like the roaming power variant, namely cuz of the use of greatsword/swordMH

if anyone can expand on that specific one id be grateful

hah hectic time for me to come back. guess i should avoid things like spvp for a while and just level up a bit.

ya i heard about that, but by how much? how much does that affect total damage? and does it get anything in return for that damage loss?

mainly with trats and skills.

i love the mobility of sword mainhand and dagger offhand, feels crazy good running around.

i enjoy aesthetics of greatsword as well, nothing feels more dnd to me then using a big twohander with my rangers.

is there any good builds that use these two? pvp, wvw, pve, etc…i dont HAVE to have both in a single build, but being able to use them in some aspect of play would make me a happy camper.

with such little experience with rangers, long time away, and with a new patch coming up, was hoping for help on this.

hmm so far as mainly martial classes are considerned sounds like ranger is where its at.

what are peoples opinions on them?

any classes that fit this?

best i can suggest is time CC for in between there evades, they are actually not that tanky, just have a lot of healing/dodging, they have high armor yes but usually very low hp (i have 13.8k hp and 3k armor when i use my DB build)

ok my build for double dagger death blossom is 0/0/10/30/30

slowed pulse: your gonna be stacking bleeds fast, this lets for early regen
vigorous recovery: this works with vigorous recover and signet of malice to allow perma vigor while in combat
quick recovery: MOAR regen
quick pockets: use this on Cd to maximize ini regen
uncatchable: more bleeds, more cripple
bountiful theft: cuz it benefits you more then thrill of the crime
hastened replenishment: yes even more ini regen

shamans amulet/gem
6/6 rune of the undead
sigil of energy, sigil of geomancy, sigil of hydromancer, sigil of doom

stats are 1897 attack (1226 from condition)
4% crit
3053 armor
13,805 hp (744 healing power)

skills: signet of malice, caltrops, roll for initiative, shadowstep/signet of agility

gameplay: basic theme is a aoe bleed, dodging machine. your excel at holding a point cuz its kitten near impossible to kill you. you are however entirely focused on that, you dont have shortbow to get away if things go wrong.

run in, if you can right away lay down caltrops, then death blossom 3x, immediatly hit steal, deathblossom, weapon swap+use steal item if you want, deathblossom, roll for initiative, cast shadow step slightly behind them, deathblossom once or twice, dodge, dodge, dodge, deathblossom, weapon swap, death blossom, hit signet of malice, death blossom

you get the idea…you can do all that without pausing. if you get to the point where you need to gain some cover, CnD and try to run away or heartseeker away.

you do 2 deathblossoms your slowed pulse kicks and and your regenning, which kicks in vigorous recover which allows you to dodge 3x before you run out of endurance. with sigil of energy for when you swap back to your starting weapons this will give you another dodge.

you can replace shadowstep with signet of agility for even more dodging, as each dodge puts down a mini caltrops.

sigil of hydromancy allows some control so they arent running around too much, sigil of geomancy for more bleeds, sigil of doom cuz poison is a good debuff to have.

its a…really potent build so long as you can avoid getting stunned or knocked down.

Jefzor.7145:

Oh, you’re using it in sPvP?
I think it’s better suited in WvW, where there’s bigger groups to troll and more space to run.

in wvwvw i think there is more merit to some skills like descent in shadow. it can work in wvw fine, just think some minor tweaks to it.

that is indeed a unicorn build. it focuses on high initiative regen and lots of dodges.

a true bunker unicorn build uses two double dagger weapon sets to abuse the trait where when you switch weapons you gain 3 ini. i also max out tricks for the skill that gives you 4 ini when you use a healing spell.

caltrops on dodge, shaman amulet, etc, i dont remember everything. youll have just under 14k hp but have high armor. you gotta learn how to balance your DB with your dodges, with your ini regen and you can keep evading for a VERY long time.

ya its pretty much a troll build, not really designed to kill, just frustrate as they have a hard time killing you. honestly after farming so many kills in hotjoin, its a refreshing change of objective lol.

ive been tweaking it a lot honestly. both the troll version and a more competitive version.

i run D/P because black powder will force someone off you asap then you can freely hs into stealth. that and shadow shot means nobody is gonna be getting away from me either.

the goal isnt really killing but interference.

ive been messing with diff ideas and i made a more damaging form thats a but sturdier. 3k armor, 3k power, 17,xxx hp. but only 18% crit. in exchange i have multiple ways to generate fury, and i take hidden killer over executioner for auto backstab crits. I dont know if its good yet but i like the idea of the high armor and high power with semi decent hp.

Eduardo.4675:

“…then you dont have the critical thinking skills required to play the game beyond hotjoin.”

Ok, lets see the amount of info on this build that my critical thinking gets from the body of the post:
-“3 of your 4 utility slots allow for mobility/stealth and condition removal.” What are these utility slots? I see nothing in the body of the post about these, i fail at critical thinking i guess…
-“last refuge-you cant really choose it as its default going down stealth but its nice.” Really? thanks captain obvious… why did you dedicate a useless line to a mandatory minor trait? which incidentally adds nothing to a “plethora of automatically triggering defenses” build?
-“its kinda fun>.<”. Thank you very much. This is all i need to know about how to play this build. Its kinda fun. No direction, no purpose, just “Its kinda fun”. And a “bigger than” and a “minor than” signal.
And, of course, there is the rune set, the amulet and the jewel. Of which i know nothing. This critical thinking is gonna give me all the answers i need. Its that or play hotjoin.

Edit: i just took the time to read the body of you post and the rest of your replies better, and my critical thinking is reaching critical mass with the concealed defeat trait. Its a critical strikes trait, if i recall correctly. In a build with 30 in shadows, 30 in acrobatics and 10 in trickery. And, obviously, 10 in critcal strikes. 80 points. And i should replace that because “why not make it even more frustrating to finish a downed thief?” Oh yeah. If anything frustrates me, its downed thieves. Those buggers.

whats funny is there actually isnt a typo there or something indirect, i said you could go either way and id probably go the other way, hence why my final build suggested 0/0/30/30/10.

it has a lot of redundancy tho which im trying to comb thru. redundancy isnt exactly a bad thing when you have “enough” of it, but having too much is wasted points. so im branching it out, trying to find a balance between survival and power where i have as much survival as is needed, without it becoming wasted points. for instance slowed pulse, and shadows rejuvination, not exactly needed together, at b est it would lengthen the regen since im pretty sure i dont get 2 regens.

like i said though ive had a hang over all day and it hurts to look at the computer, its just a bad side effect that it also makes me want to try different build concepts. ill get things cleaned up once ive nursed this and come back with a clearer, more focused build off the same concept. and ill be nicer too.

edit: i really like the hard to catch talent if it works fast enough to counteract misplays, or things like a backstab thief using basilisk venom…im just not sure if its worth the ten points…its like a failsafe, does nothing till you mess up.

if you cant take the time to read teh body of the post, then you dont have the critical thinking skills required to play the game beyond hotjoin.

/sigh, i hate how finicky this stuff is.

i outlined the buidl in the main body of the post anyways. its basically 30 shadow, 30 acro, 10 tricks. lots of healing, removal, ability to dodge, and blinds. great support.

http://gw2.luna-atra.fr/skills_tool/?lang=en&code=3c3ag0fnmq7r7tn2i00akua989jj9jdjjjljo

the idea is to give yourself a plethora of automatically triggering defensive options to compliment your already survivable baseline abilities.

its pretty much a fun little troll build.

3 of your 4 utility slots allow for mobility/stealth and condition removal.

concealed defeat-because why not make it even more frustrating to finish a downed thief, this is probably the most uncertain one to take. id consider dumping it for something else like shadow rejuv, or some endurance restoring.

last refuge-you cant really choose it as its default going down stealth but its nice.

slowed pulse-moar regen

cloaked in shadow-this skill is almost troll worthy on its own, especially with dagger/pistol

descent of shadows-useful at times, may not be that good in spvp and needs replacing tho lest you can find areas to abuse it.

pain response-more healing, more cond removal

hard to catch-beacuse you cant avoid all the stuns

instinctual response-gonna take a big hit? free gtfo spell

if you want to tailor it more for pvp id say forget concealed defeat (potentially) and get shadows rejuv, then switch descent of shadows to either fleet of shadow or vigorous recover.

its kinda fun >.<

KratosAngel.7289:

Agree with OP, stealth stomp is quite unfair and maybe a bit OP … The thief can come from a distance stealthed all the time and stomp you without you knowing …

yes 4 seconds out we can stealth from…woot

when i get time later this evening ill repost my “blind thief” build i posted a few months back. I believe its still relevant to this game as when i use it, outside of a stun train from half or more of hte opposing team i dont die.

blinds out the wazoo, automatied defense response, regeneration adn stealth abuse.

dagger/pistol power/crit

pistol/dagger condition

or something original like my tanky blind thief build i posted a while back

that sounds like such a pain to do and still doesnt sound infinite stealth, not too mention a waste in initaitive.

my DP build is capable of hitting almost as hard as the DD backstab build, but is also more sturdy (tho to do that damage i spend more ini). its also better team support.

its why i run it, damage nad team support.

i disagree iwth pvp being too slow, i hate fast reaction based games where the person who goes first is the winner. i like some tactics.

as for other points, yes and no

i really dont get everyones distaste for downed state, all i get out of it is whiny kids who think because other games when a players health goes to 0 its over, it should be that way in this game, i havent seen any other relevant information presented as to why its bad.

as for 1v1 duels, i think dueling would be fine, but i dont think they should balance around it (nigh impossible)

dagger pistol inf stealth? what build is taht?

for a dagger pistol thif to get stealth they have to combo black powder and HS, thats 9 ini on its own, way more then double dagger CnD.

and inf stealth? how are they getting that?

i run a dagger/pistol in 3 different builds only one abuses stealth (and has a ton of ini regen to compensate) and even that cant inf stealth.

Thraize.9608:

Perma stealth thieves? Pistol number 5 and heartseeker combo?

thieves dont have perma stealth, its a rendering issue that for some reason they STILL HAVENT FIXED

pistol number 5….black powder? it costs over half our initiative to use once and you can nullify it by moving out of the small stationary radius that is clearly marked…lol sorry you want to hundred blades me.

heartseeker combo? there is no combo, just heartseeker, and its not strong, i do more dps autoattacking the first 50% of the enemies hp.

fail is fail <3

Rhaj.5261:

Does anyone else feel this? The pvp feels completely empty, by that I mean your really only spamming 1-2 skills over and over till your enemy is dead. Ontop of that combat feels so slow paced for many classes. Take Aion for example. The PvP there has that fast paced action to it while gw2 you kinda just wait for your one damg skill to come off CD just to use it again, and then have your enemy heal. I was In a fight today in WvW 2 guardians, the fight lasted for literally 10min then we both gave up cause we have no way of dealing fast damg and keeping dps on each other.

So it just ended up Oh better use number 2 skill again for the 50th time. Oh man look at that he healed again and hes running away, guess ill hit 3 and leap at him, look at that barely any damg done.. k I will pull him in with 5.. dodge..damn..ok 2 is off cd I guess ill use that again and blink to him. Oh! finally hes almost dead, nope he healed yet again.

Even for other classes like ranger or warrior you just spam one good skill over and over again till they die. Seriously how is this considered real pvp? I tried so hard to like this game, but damn the pvp is seriously lacking and boring. You would think for a game that is heavy on PvP there would be more skills and more depth to the combat.

Edit: I have about 600 hours into the game. Played since beta So don’t tell me how to play my class or say your just a noob. About 450 of those hours where spent pvping

first

lol @ 600 hours into the game, ill believe it when you supply a time stamped full proof link with your RL picture and address just so i can stop by and convince your mom to kick you out of hte house.

but on topic. i hate rediculously fast TTK pvp games, its not fun and doesnt promote ambushes.

also your a guardian, you dont do much damage, two guardians fighting is like to healers fighting in wow pvp…no where fast.

perfect balance is impossible, balance where with the proper spec, is close enough that player skill can be a bigger factor then the unbalance…is possible (tho difficult)

i hate bad thiefs that put all there eggs in a basket and spamm one ability, i play dagger/pistol and focus more on team support even tho im capable of great uptime and damage. i utilize my entire skill bar in a fight. because its a team game, not a freaking duel.

KnarleyMarley.6937:

Anyone else feel like stealth stomping needs to gtfo? I mean, the state purpose of the downed system is for players to feel like they’re not out of the fight even when they go down, they still have a chance. Not to mention that it encourages smart pvp plays like reviving teammates when the benefits out weigh the costs.

I have no issues with stability stomps, mist form stomps etc… because there are still some, all though few things you or team mates can do (if you teammates are aware and paying attention). Stealth how ever gives you no one to target for your cc or the ability to check for buffs like stability before using your cc cool downs. It also means your teammates most likely won’t even know to help you, and no one can target the ‘stomper’ for dps, you just have to hope you get lucky and someone comes in with enough aoe to do the job.

Stealth is by far the strongest stomp ability in the game, and maybe it’s just me but basically negating the entire downed state just feels a little bit over the top. Thoughts?

this is false, any damage wills till hit the thief, and any non targeted CC will affect the thief.

stability stomp is by far the strongest

but hell, at this point if it was removed it wouldnt even matter to me save for the fact then youll start complaining about blind stomps.

been gone for a while saw they changed a number of things on the 14th, was wondering what and if any new builds arrived.

the buff on fleet shadows makes me swoon tho, always loved that one.

ill say it again, NOTHING should be changed for the sake of wvwvw unless it leads to complete zone dominance that otherwise wouldnt happen

you know how warriors have special powerful moves that require adrenaline?

its kinda like that tho instead of being built up it requries a specific target and a 45 second CD to be off CD.

Jumper.9482:

You’re not seeing the big picture here.
If you can pop up from mid to the enemy’s far point completely undetected at any time, that means the enemy team can’t have a bunker sitting inbetween points (ex: foefire: ele, engie on cliff).
So you either HAVE to have a mesmer on your team with portal on point, or fight mid 4v5.
I don’t want to see any one class being required for a team to compete competitively.

so because a class can screw with a current accepted strat its OP?

no, thats how the game evolves kitten /p>

SoulstitchMMO.1396:

Wolfe.3097:

report them for hacking?

perma stealth, especially with latest patch, shouldnt be possible

approx perma stealth, they appear for .5 sec then are gonna again

perhaps its hte rendering issue? revealed debuff is supposed to get applied 100% of the time now after landing any attack, which means he should be visible for 3 seconds minimum (probably a fraction of a second longer due to human reaction time/speed).

so the only things i can think of are lag, rendering issue, or hacking.

Kyus.3812:

I play my thief heavily in WvW and dagger storm is very very very very overpowered when compared too pretty much every other elite in the game. The duration of it needs to be shortened.

I really only play a thief main and that is it. but the thief forum has a responsibility to not just out right lie about the strength of our class. The only other class that can currently touch a good thief is a Mesmer. Dagger storm particularly in WvW is part of this and does need to be reduced down to a more balanced level.

no skill should be nerfed for the sake of WvWvW

daggerstorm is completly avoidable and stoppable, the fact that the thief has no mitigation against melee for its duration is one of its major weaknesses, using it in a group just means that group was too stupid to gib him.

report them for hacking?

perma stealth, especially with latest patch, shouldnt be possible

Malicious.6742:

You have to stay in it for 4s. After that you got 8s of stealth during which you can move around freely.

ok, thats not 10 seconds but ok

but agian, im not getting what the OP is complaining about exactly, about a thief using SR while capturing a point?

Daharahj.1325:

The main problem thieves have is Cloak and Dagger, whoever came up with that skill and endless traits to mitigate iniciative costs needs to get fired.

no, if there is an issue its hte ability to precast cloak and then hit steal and not interrupt cloaks cast.

hell if you use cloak in melee range it can be juked, interrupted, avoided, etc, it has a freaking cast time.

how you can come in here nad post something like this? what if anet is ok with gibbing? especially if its glass cannon vs glass cannon??

coming here and stating “obviously this part of the game should/shouldnt work this way” without citing an agreement from the game developer is ignorant at best. not defending instagibbing, but stating, you dont know if its intended or not.

Jumper.9482:

Pre-casting it during a match will land you on the enemy’s point completely unseen.
10 seconds of stealth is far too much.
In tPvP, the main purpose a thief (BS&PW) brings over other classes is to get in unnoticed and burst someone down before they can react (because they didn’t notice you; less time to prepare/react).
10 Seconds of stealth just trivializes this as the enemy team can’t even tell what half of the map the thief is on.
SFuge, if kept the way it is now, I believe should be given 1 less tick. At LEAST make it 5-7 seconds of stealth.

Thanks.
-R45 Thief Player, 1600+ Games Played [on Thief].

it has a visible border for its duration and a big freaking house above it when first put down. not too mention its a fixed point, you have to stay in it pretty much its full duration, doing nothing, to get 10 seconds of stealth.

can you explain in better detail what your complaining about?

this is wvwvw

your points are therefore invalidated

show this in s/tpvp along with enemy players acting smarter then a npc tethered wandering mob and ill bite

@krustydog the fact that your complaining about wvwvw invalidates a lot of the merit behind your claims just fyi.