Guild Wars 2

@asmodean, i agree they really need to fix that rending issue with stealth, i think it would make worlds a difference.

then nerf/remove assassins signet and probably signet of power (2 important pieces to the rediculous bakcstab glass cannon builds)

but honestly the difference between some glass cannons and non glass cannon builds can be far too much toughness and HP. even with nerfing damage thieves will just because of there mechanics be a bain on any glass cannon build they get the drop on. they would have to nerf the damage so the average glass cannon thief would do maybe 3k crits tops on a glass cannon build, which would mean vs a warrior with 20-25k hp you dbe doing like 1-1.5k crits.

hard to balance with such a big gap.

please if there is any deletion it is due to arguing or some other forum rule was broken.

for instance your post could be locked and deleted for calling people blind sheep liberals.

and the fact that you can state absolutes leads me to believe your quite full of yourself to do that while also leaving a blanket insult for half the people on these forums.

theres a lot of good games out right now, borderlands 2, mists of pandaria (no monthly fee here means people can play both, i do) just to name a couple.

heck im trying to play all 3 atm (failing i might add lol)

Imix.6152:

Invisibility is the biggest issue imo, these 2 classes happening to be the only ones with constant access to it. The ability to deal damage and then avoid recoil… constantly having the “first attack” advantage is just too strong imo.

while that is a sharing factor there are so many other issues to come out and call one the deciding factor is just not possible.

i cant speak for mesmers but for thieves

we have a rather simple system compared to things like elementalists.

it allows bad players to “spam” and good players to take advantage of a flexible combat system

we have stealth bugs (in favor of thief)

glass cannon backstab build while being the worst build for getting glory or team fights, can still oneshot someone everyu 45 seconds and needs addressed in such a way that doesnt hurt thieves spec diversity in the long run

just to name a few things.

lets get the bugs fixed, then the unbalanced skill addressed eh?

the stealth bugs do provide a real issue tho. i dont think either class would pose nearly the problem to people if that was addressed.

Poxxia.1547:

Wolfe.3097:

Flappy.2837:

So what part of the “I’ve tried all builds recommended on the forum ive tried my own build for 2 days now and nothing works” didn’t you understand?
So if it is a L2P issue explain to me the scenario then instead of just “Durr L2P my class is fine”
Start with the if i get the opener, and then if he gets the opener, if it is a L2p issue i will gladly take it. And not just toughness fixes everything, as i said, i tried the different builds.

trying them=/=getting good at them

most people over estimate there skills too

but honestly, necros need buffs (or maybe not since the last set i dont know) and there are aspects of thieves that need nerfs.

Names … give me names. Saying “most ppl think yadayda” … you might as well have said “most ppl think the moon turns green, when not looked upon” and made a survey of 1. Why can’t ppl argue in a way where at least some methodical consistency is preserved, instead of this imaginary blabber?

give you names? really? this is a largely anomynous game unless you try to get to know a player, heck even in guilds i dont try to get to know someone personally.

but its not imaginary blabber. People tend to either undervalue themselves (no confidence) or over value themselves (confidence). its just human nature.

but give you names? lol you mine as well of come out and said you have no real counter argument.

Flappy.2837:

So what part of the “I’ve tried all builds recommended on the forum ive tried my own build for 2 days now and nothing works” didn’t you understand?
So if it is a L2P issue explain to me the scenario then instead of just “Durr L2P my class is fine”
Start with the if i get the opener, and then if he gets the opener, if it is a L2p issue i will gladly take it. And not just toughness fixes everything, as i said, i tried the different builds.

trying them=/=getting good at them

most people over estimate there skills too

but honestly, necros need buffs (or maybe not since the last set i dont know) and there are aspects of thieves that need nerfs.

im confused. a thief spaming stealth but using stuns? your playing vs a odd build there, most of the time they dont need stuns if they are using backstab.

also whats he doing to gain this stealth? depending on his weapon set and his utilities.

but really, a necro with condition damage should kill a thief so long as that thief isnt a stupid glass cannon backstab thief with his CD’s up.

if a class even has a slight advantage, or hell, if its percieved as having one by the masses, you will see a flood of them in spvp due to the unique nature of arena nets pvp (auto level to 80, given gear, etc)

yes there are aspects of each that need nerfing/adjusting/fixed. tho not to the extent many would have you believe.

@Meikun, utterly OP? please.

they have specific trats/abilities that need tuning.

the fact that you say “i dont care what they nerf about them” should eliminate your entire post from even giving merit to the discussion.

they are about burst damage and mobility. certain specs have too much burst, and maybe too much mobility (different specs)

untouchable shadow state? we have a shadow state? you talking about stealth? its far from untouchable and if your noob enough to run a spec with absolutly no non target required damage moves/aoes or condition damage thats your problem.

however stealth IS bugged atm in favor of the thief and it needs fixing.

we dont have many anti condition skills, in fact thieves are one of the worse off classes for condition removal in a group setting, now in 1v1 its a bit different if they spec accordingly, but it doesnt have the same effect in group play (you know, where the game is balanced around)

lets see execute>teleport>execute>blind invis thingy>execute…ya 3. its probably unbalanced and needs looking at honestly.

stealth kill on downed players however is not unbalanced at all. stability executes are far more effective.

there is definitly some balancing needed for downed state tho.

explain what dirt throw does please? instead of saying its lame. the interrupt does what its supposed to do, your not supposed to solo out with downed state, just help you survive to get a rez…which is another erason thieves might have too strong of a downed state.

everyone has general healing tho

your a whiner, you give no real information other then you not liking X

in this game, any class that is easy to pick up and play and see results will be flooding spvp because there is almost no commitment (create, log on, go to heart of mists, spec up and fight). this provides a unique opportunity for arenanet.

thieves have overpowered skills, overpowered/silly specs. thieves have bugs that favor them. But thief is not as bad as you make it out. i mean you get mad about a glass cannon backstab thief oneshotting you, but its perspective biased, you dont see the other 45 seconds where they make virtually no impact on the fight (its honestly the worst spec for getting glory or even competing). yes the spec needs fixed, but its not omg completly OP like people make it out, its omg completly OP for one target every 45 seconds….yay. not defending it, as its a dumb build anyways, but juszt trying to give perspective to bandwagoning nerf herders

yes it can, but its not, and like i said, it needs fixing, sooner rather then later

KogarasuMaru.7036:

1 vs 1, thief is no prob. But when you’re in the middle of combat with someone else, and your hp suddenly drops 15k in 1 second, isn’t that a bit over the top? Keep in mind thieves can stealth and shadowstep from far away to prevent you even noticing them. This is specifically the backstab build. 95% guaranteed kill every 45 secs.

While that build does need addressing, it is not “the” backstab build, it is “a” backstab build that utilizing very specific trait set to do dstupid amounts of damage.

even with 30 points into critical strikes nad 2880 attack i dont get near that type of backstab crit damage.

what needs to be addressed are some of those traits/skills. assassins signet for one (150% damage on next hit) and power signets is a trait that needs looking at, its pretty much built for the backstab spec (5 stacks of might for 5 seconds after activating a signet)

even tho it needs addressing its also the least game impacting spec, only able to impact a single target once every 45 seconds. this doesnt change however that it does need fixing.

I really dont want to see a direct nerf to backstab skill itself, the thief already has a issue with only speccing glass cannon, nerfing backstab would just further diminish non glass cannon dagger mainhand builds. rather nerfing the abilities that make backstab hit so hard seems a smarter choice, resulting in nerfing the rediculous glass cannon backstab build, while not reducing thieves to playing glass cannon only.

Asmodean.5820:

Assumingly class A can achieve the result that class B, C etc can do by just pressing one button while the others need to weapon switch and press several buttons then class A has a time advantage simply because it can fire off more abilities in the given time.

We can discuss now at length if it is “op” , however it is certainly “bad game design”.

The weapon switching I do on my necro and attunement switching on my ele cannot by compared even closely to playing e.g. my thief. It is like playing Beethoven (for the former) and Old McDonalds had a farm (for the latter)on my keyboard.

so your upset cuz a class is easier to play?

so much hate in this thread.

they are not OP in tourneys, not by a long shot. they get countered by any competent group harder then nearly any other class.

that said yes there are numerous things that need changed on the thief class, from bugs, to abilities /specs that are out of line.

howver, it is not NEARLY as bad as people like ganksinatra claim. if people like him were in control of balancing hed just nerf them or delete them, make them unplayable.

you know why things like retaliation have been nerfed before all these “problems”? cuz they are not as big of deals as people think.

fact is regardless of how unbalanced a thief is, its not what its about anymore, playerbase has branded tehm for slaughter and they wont rest until they are bottom tier, hell, below bottom tier. and then they will defend/rant over the next OP thing and demand justice!

edit: not too mention boring or lame is highly subjective to personal bias

I run a D/P backstab build (no not the infamous glass cannon one shot builds, my damage isnt nearly that high even with 2880 attack). my only real damage moves are backstab, autoattack, and HS if target is low on hp.

I make full use of my weapon set however. I black powder to disrupt group fights and to support my team during the downed state. i interrupt spells with headshot, and despite shadow shots limitations i use it to close gaps.

yet when i kill someone half the time they whisper/mail me or call me out in the map channel saying im a HS spamming noob, even tho i have a bad habit of forgetting to use HS at all to kill someone!

half the people that rant about thieves are people like that.

its not permanent, its a lag/bug

and yes it needs fixing

marianitten.1247:

My “main” is a necromancer. We have, 1/2sec fear to 1 character only.

Then I tried the Elementalist, and they can walk wherever they want for a short time… WTF?!
Another profession have an AOE stun(idk wich). Makes no sense.

I suggest that in sPvP, al the professions in downed state need to have the exact Skill Set because if this pretend to be an eSport, Balance is the most important thing.

ya and while we are at it everyone needs to ahve the same skills and weapon sets because balance is the most important thing! wwooooot!

Relentliss.2170:

CptCosmic.3156:

Overall it looks like a very poor game mechanics when a thief still hits for that much damage and is able to down a target in under a second when the target carries the soldiers amulet/jewel which should make you very durable against direct damage.

Agree 100%.

Their damage is out of proportion with people’s health. And the way initiative works it promotes spamming.

Damage needs to be looked at.
Initiative needs to cost more as you spam some of the high damage skills or cd needs to be put in.

it only promotes spamming if your a nitwit with no critical thinking skills. rather it allows spamming, which is still bad, ive suggested ways to alleviate this without removing the unique mechanics of the thief profession.

and i think damage needs to be handled in such a way so that a thief can afford to spec non glass cannon. in other words, we need to figure out a way to lower glass cannon damage without hurting non glass cannon builds. just nerfing base damage of backstab wont do that.

@teoh

what i was saying is anet specifically said they are not gonna balance classes aroud wvwvw. so using pve gear to show off pvp potential isnt a valid argument.

im not arguing against a buff to condition damage, im just saying it has its place.

yes everything can be dodged, since you know…dodge gives you immunity frames essentially. but some things are easier then others. for instance dodging a 100b warrior charge is easier then dodging a pistol sneak attack.

and while pistol mainhand bleeds do less damage then D/D they are harder to dispel effectively since they can be used more often (less ini cost) and their timer runs out much faster.

Merciless.5349:

I’m wondering, cause there’s some classes out there who don’t use weapon swaps and just spam 1-2 skills.

Examples: Crossfire, Pistol Whip, 100 Blades.

Weapon swapping should be encouraged, but why would they bother if all they use is 1-2 keys and it is still viable?

Yea, yea, let people play the way they want to play, but for sPvP, where do you draw the line between useful/broken/balanced?

How can it be considered competitive if there’s no “skill” involved?

as for pistol whip, its not 1 skill…its aloways 2

youll never land pistol whip by itself

so you precast it and then use steal/iniltrator strike

you pair it with immobilizes like devourers venom

so its almost always like 3+7, 3+8, 3+F1, 3+2 etc (the bindings for the abilities)

rickshaw, i honestly think your playing D/P wrong. D/D is better roaming build imo, D/P better for group fights. The reason D/P is becoming more popular is because 8v8 is a zergfest, people are realizing that in order to gain the best glory they gotta run with the zerg. D/P is better in groups, therefore it just makes sense.

tho also taking advantage of the noobs that stand in the powder is another aspect of it.

plus the way i look at it, in 1v1 vs smart player. they run in, you put down BP, they start to run out, you auto them a few times, then HS into stealth for a backstab. now you can either auto them, or BP again forcing them to once again move (I.E. your not taking damage), and repeat.

it is very ini intensive, but i can for some reason do it without stopping because of all my ini regen mechanics

you kill em faster, ill give you that, but that wasnt what i was looking for when i went to D/P…so honestly i think its playstyle.

ill say it again, BP is so much more then a killzone, and relying on it for such is a bad way to play.

Krathalos.3461:

Cloak and Dagger will do more damage and can be lead into Steal for a Mug -> CND -> Backstab combo that will instantly kill most squishy builds.

This is the reason D/D is used more often. There is no other weapon combination that allows this much burst. Yeah, D/P is great for 1v1 or PvE, but it doesn’t match the damage on D/D. You also lose Dancing Dagger, which is insane when fighting outnumbered. I’ve won 2-4v1s just by spamming Dancing Dagger.

and that is gonna get nerfed (the 15k+ backstab glass cannon build) make no illusion of it. the only question is what facet of it will be nerfed to bring the damage down. backstab? assassins signet? i dont know. but yes it is the reason its used more often, people like killing other players in 2 seconds.

DP is also better for team fight support during the downed state in pvp.

dancing dagger is underrated imo too tho.

rickshaw.5279:

HackerTeivospy.2031:

Smoke + HS + Steal = 6 overal cost

DD

CnD + Steal = 6 overall cost

First off, who the hell are you playing against? Who uses steal as a follow up to CnD? Secondly your math is wrong. CnD with trait is 4 Init not 6. Steal w/ trait would put that @ a total cost of 1. Your first example should be 4 BTW. Smoke -6, HS w/ trait -1 steal w/ trait +3. Total 4.

Finally the reason D/P is inferior DPS wise is because of the time it takes you to do things as well as cost. Using your own crazy azz rotations above, you’d be out of initiative long before D/D while taking longer to do the same exact damage that D/D can do. Also assuming that you have a complete kitten who doesn’t know to move out of smoke when he sees it.

weird, ive played both D/D and D/P a lot (pvp) and didnt find much of a difference when trying to apply my damage. This is because of the nature of CnD vs BP>HS.

CnD people see coming, it has a obvious animation, and you have to be kissing the target to land it. anyone with half a brain dont want a thief that close. so its a lot of running trying to maintain that distance while you cast CnD.

Meanwhile so long as im facing the player or targeting him/her i can just BP>HS…which naturally closes some ground, and approach from stealth.

in theory youd be right, but in practice vs live players i didnt find it to be the case. plus if you take appropriate talents you rarely are out of ini.

This is the build im currently using

http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#cckzMc9cMFRvMMFRvMaxx9MczaqVaq

i adjusted it to fit my playstyle (dont like saving steal as its a better gap closer then shadow shot imo). often times ill sit in my BP as long as my enemy lets me while i autoattack. usually using the back end of its duration to enter stealth. i also try to place the Bp strategically in team fights.

but suffice to say, with the amount of ini regen mechanics i have, even with 12 ini i rarely if ever have an issue.

FiendGore.6205:

I’m not sure I oversighted it, but no one here mention the damage output of CnD vs. BP->HS. You lose almost over half the damage on a single target along with the blow of initiative. CnD>BP->HS. I do concur, however, of the utility of BP. Having a smoke cloud for a down player. Using Shadow Refuge is a better option (IMO) to remove the aggression from yourself and down players (PvE and PvP). The things I “think/feel” holds value with an offhand pistol is Headshot. Interupts are huge in many situation and can mitigate a lot of unecessary damage (PvE and PvP). And the ability to mostly keep a blind debuff at most times between the powder and re-entering stealth(Cloaked In Shadow). Again all things default to playstyle and what you are trying to counter/support.

in terms of purely aquiring stealth yes when you land CnD its plain better. however i use pistol in offhand for far more then just aquiring stealth. plus you can have shadow refuge and BP, and shadow refuge is a longish Cd. further i dont really think shadow refuge is better, better in ways, worse in others.

but i agree with your last statement. I took to DP because i found i could mess with the downed state to a much greater degree then with D/D.

Secondly, anyone who’s sticking around for BP is an idiot or stunned. No one with even a modicum of experience against thieves is going to stay melee when BP pops. It’s far too situational to take full advantage of. It’s primary use in PvP is for coordinated team play with other Thieves. Two GCD’s and multiple Thieves stealth for a nuke bomb of epic proportions.

firstly if your relying on BP to get kills your using it wrong. Yes it can be used that way, and in 8v8 zergs i have used it to great effect since people seem to be more interested in what button they are gonna press next rather then getting out of the bad. it shines in supporting your team during the downed state (executing or rezzing). along with headshot and shadow refuge you can make it nigh impossible for your enemy to land executes while helping your team greatly.

also, nothing works better then popping that BP on top of that warrior thats trying to train your teammate into the ground, and wathcing him forced to get out of the circle. yes he can switch to ranged, and thats fine, BP should have weaknesses and you just work around them.

TeoH.2098:

Paranoid.9542:

to get anything reasonable with PW/BS you have to build glass cannon and you likely also have to use up util slots to make them viable.

No that’s just what every genius on the forum tells you to build because they like seeing big numbers. Did you think that ‘9k’ was the damage a pistol whip did in a full glass cannon build with utility cooldowns? Christ no, try 14-15k. My numbers are conservative precisely because i usually run a balanced build with a decent amount of Vitality and Toughness.

Mix Invader / Valkyrie and Berzerker gear, run points in Acrobatics for better endurance and some health. You can push 9k Pistol whips with 18k health and 2.3k armour in crafted gear. Even if you want to go tankier than that, the gap in damage is so huge that it won’t change the comparison.

talking about WvWvW is not a good indicator of anything but your gear level.

i look at it like this. power attacks you avoid or use mitigation tools BEFORE you are hit by them. many large hitting power based attacks have tells so you can avoid them.

condition you deal with after its on you. the fact that it ignores armor/toughness is to give it more incentive.

This is part of why people like P/D for thieves for bleeds over deathblossom. less ini intensive, and the bleeds only last a couple seconds or so, making it hard for the defending player to simply remove it when its been applied.

@Valador, thats not the impression i got at all.

rather what i got. is bunker is simply out of line atm. (and with the right build it is). not by a huge, but enough that its noticeable.

also if you want to talk counters.

bunker beats burst, burst beats sustained (conditions), sustained beats bunker.

Ensign.2189:

Engineer gets at most 3 skills that benefit from condition damage on pistol / pistol; Ranger is in the same boat on Shortbow. Thief gets 2 skills that apply conditions on several weapons (Shortbow is bugged but no matter), but gets to spam skills situationally instead of being cooldown limited. LDB + poison on the autoattack more or less qualifies as a condition build given the standards set by other classes.

Of course you also get two good burst skills on D/D. That’s why it’s such a nice set, it can be played either way situationally.

Pistol/Pistol is kind of blah since Body Shot was nerfed into the ground and Unload lost its identity when the Sigil of Earth got eviscerated; it’s a weak set in general though so it’s not a good basis for comparison.

Sneak Attack from Cloak and Dagger is very nice, unfortunately that and the cripple is basically the entire set. It’s not bad though, and dishes out a good amount of condis even without condition damage on any other skills.

thats why its a bad set, its weaker because its split into trying to accomplish two things at once, resulting in a shallower skillset lacking identity.

Pistol And Dagger’s Bleed does 3 times less damage then Death Blossoms bleed and you do NOT get a poison or a roll.

Poison is also on D/D, if you want to remove conditions from the set, you should remove that as well.

D/D also restores Endurance.

I think they should lower the damage of backstab and add a bleed and poison to it and make all of D/D condition based, and make heartseeker also add a bleed.

Atm though, we are one of the last classes that needs redesigned, except for pistol/pistol and Flanking Strike.

well…that would be one way to get me to stop playing this game…

CptCosmic.3156:

there is one big problem I have with the thief, it is the damage out of stealth combined with quickness buff. my engineer carries the soldiers amulet/jewl (yeah right the one with thoughness, vitality and power) and he drops before the thiefs stealth reappear animation ends. additionally the client often refuses to load the player model for a second (which is a known bug since beta btw) which makes it even worse.

I thought that this cannot be true thus I rolled a thief 2 weeks ago and I could not believe how easy it is to achieve such high amounts of damage. there is no way someone can react in time to do anything and even if you manage to do something in this split second, it only delays death anyway as you will be almost dead. it seems that thoughness does not help as much against big hits as it does against many small ones thus you still get hit for almost 8k backstabs even with the bonus thoughness from soldiers amulet.

Overall it looks like a very poor game mechanics when a thief still hits for that much damage and is able to down a target in under a second when the target carries the soldiers amulet/jewel which should make you very durable against direct damage.

its almost universally agreed that backstab burst needs tuning, however ive said before, just nerfing backstab will result in nerfing the damage of non uber glass cannon builds too. makes more sense to nerf the root causes of this problem, a few traits and assassins signet namely.

Daays.4317:

Most D/D thieves take shadow refuge, shadowstep, and a signet. If they run movespeed, they don’t have a 2nd gap closer. If they run the shadowstep signet, they move slower and aren’t as mobile for backcapping or in combat.

I fail to see how tough choices that have there own strengths and weaknesses as a problem, just cuz we cant have it all doesnt mean much balancewise. spec accordingly and play around your weaknesses is the best one can do

The main reason for mentioning slows is that while it’s a great counter to D/D thieves, it’s really not that useful because of game design. You want to create distance but because this is a point control game, you’re giving up your control point for a kill. If someone comes in to reinforce the thief during your fight, you’re going to go down quickly and they will cap it faster.

I think it simply means if you spec for ranged you probably shouldnt try and solo node cap. but there are other aspects of pvp rather then spvp.

As such, the D/D main weakness is removed due to game design. While S/P weaknesses are still relevant.

i still say conditions are more of a weakness to the profession as a whole rather then slows, you can build around slows easier then conditions with thieves.

But side note: the one random condition becomes much less random when those condition classes only have one primary condition on you. A condition thief for example will be stacking bleeds. Just bleeds. And the stealth regen isn’t weak at all. It’s ~10% of your health if you wait for the full duration.
Then you have shadowstep in case you get a good amount of conditions (typically vs engineers and mesmers only).

I understand 1v1 happens, and in those cases the random effect would be less random, chalk it up to playstyle, i seldom roam alone.

Did i say the health regen was weak? like shadows rejuvination? i use it in my D/P build atm and i agree its quite good.

Between all those you can take out a condition class with confidence.

i dont consider any class with only 1 condition damage source to be a condition class personally, but that may be a difference in opinion.

Also, what other classes can easily kill the Lord by bypassing all the guards?

sorry i dont recall you saying “by bypassing all the guards” the first time around. just to kill the lord. i did it on a ranger before.

Yukishiro.8792:

Uh that’s the point: initiative is poorly designed since it’s designed to be something where you trade off high current burst for running out later. That is just a bad system. It needs to be shifted to a system where dps is more steadily applied like other classes do.

again this has been addressed, tho if you want to discuss it further you need to provide new information

is it a bad system cuz its a bad system? or is it a bad system cuz its different from everyone elses? The system itself does what its supposed to do. its jsut that players tend to just spam things because in spvp you can get away without using your utility skills. you need to really explain why you think its a bad system, to you at least.

do you want the classes damage to be applied more steadily because you think the current state is not fixable? or beacuse you dont like thieves having burst? they could (and some specs obviously do) have too much burst. does that mean we have to scrap it entirely instead of just lessening burst to a reasonable degree?

and high current burst for running out later…i see variations of this said a lot. is this anets intention or rather a educated assumption on hte playerbase? my assumption was it was just a way to allow thieves the flexibility of using a skill back to back. i can see how people would assume/think what you said tho. and if thats true, how effective would a thief be if he/she was out of initiative after every kill? or kill attempt i should say?

im not stating my opinoins on this part here, not sure if i have any, but i like posing questions.

Daays.4317:

@Wolfe

That trait is a 10 second cooldown with 20 pts into the Acro tree. Only condition thieves, and to a lesser extent S/P thieves, touch that tree.

Conditions are easily delt with by going into Shadow Arts. They make most condition classes useless, outside of Engineers and Mesmers, as those are the only two classes that don’t rely upon one source of condition damage.

Slowing a backstab thief makes the class a joke. When I play a frost necro (can epidemic 15-25seconds of chilling) and a thief with the chilled debuff is just a sad sight to behold. After they engage, they have nothing to close the gap outside of their heal, and even then you just debuff them while stealthed. They do no damage because they’re not hitting anyone. Heartseeker can’t close the gap because all Leaps are affected by the slow.

Now while S/P has more mobility, it doesn’t have the power of stealth, lacks burst when haste is on cooldown, and PW can be easily interrupted. Also, S/P thieves are actually easier to kill than D/D because stealth drops target.

You slow a D/D to counter them.
You interrupt a S/P to counter them.

However, Thieves are a requirement for TPVP. I don’t know why you think otherwise. They’re the best class to steal a Svanir/Chieftan on FoN. They’re the only class that can solo the Lord on Foefire. They can teleport through walls and up the Z-Axis in BoK. Not to mention they’re one of the best treb assaulters because of thieves guild and the 1v1 power of the class.

“they only touch that tree” thats a problem with the players not the class, as any meta changes, the needs of the player changes, if slows become too devestating and widespread the thief will simply start investing in that trait line for that trait. yes it has a 10 second CD but unless you were slowed from max range that dodge+other effects is gonna get you in melee range. its not ideal, and slows hurt, but i was simply saying form my perspective i havent had that much trouble with them. to each there own

how does going down shadow arts make conditions useless? we can remove one random condition every 3 seconds in stealth if traited. we can regen health in stealth (sort of a soft defense against conditions). pain response? no control, 45 second CD, its nice, ive used it, hell i designed a thief spec to maximize the thiefs ability to remove conditions. conditions still will give you trouble simply cuz thief has relatively few effective removals for conditions.

not too mention the irony of saying dont go down tree x to deal with y, but go down tree z to deal with A.

and your snare comment with necro assumes the thief is playing a spec with no gap closers at all aside from HS. granted itll make it harder for the thief, but thats the intention, would be kinda bad if it didnt work wouldnt it?

the S/P comments are well and good, tho im not sure what your trying to prove with them.

also what you described isnt tpvp, its spvp. and there are other classes that can solo the lord dont spread misinformation.

either way good chat tho.

the difference between D/D and D/P are just what you want from yoru last 3 skills.

shadow shot is flawed in that it has a mini self root atm

death blossom splits the D/D into two seperate stat builds

dancing dagger does good damage when specced power, specially on like 2 targets.

and cloak costs cheaper but imo is less reliable.

ultimately i take pistol offhand because i love head shot and black powder for suportting my team during the downed state.

Daays.4317:

Thieves are strong because the main counter to them, slows, are not useful for most classes in TPVP.

As any ranged class with slows, thieves aren’t a problem. You slow them. They can’t easily close the gap. You just need to create distance after the Steal, Shadowstep, and heal. An immobilize can spell death. HS spam while chilled will only move the Thief forward 100-150.

But that’s the problem. Only an Engineer, Ranger, and Condition Necro want to fight from 900+ range. All other classes fight in melee range, with the Mesmer splitting time between S/P and Staff.

Then factor in that this game is all about point control and that kiting off point is punished, and all of a sudden the class’s main weakness is removed due to game design.

Stealth in this game is different. ANet wanted to remove “perma-stealth” seen in other games. So instead they granted an in-combat version of stealth.
—Stealth in other games can be activated any time OOC and breaks upon damage. Lasts forever.
—Stealth in GW2 is typically only activated in-combat and doesn’t break on damage. Lasts 3 (4) seconds.

Going to say that their vision of stealth is far more powerful. Ironic you seek to reduce the power of stealth seen in other games and end up creating something more powerful.

First, i have to tell you right now, slows are not a real counter to thieves. its just that the way players currently spec you see a lot of return on using slows on us. we have a trait, not that hard to get, that removes cripple/weakness on us whenever we dodge, and if we want we can trait to dodge a LOT. essentially nullifying yoru slows.

rather i think a counter to thieves is more along the lines of condition damage (from my experience messing with specs, it was the biggest universal difficulty for my thief) which has its own issues and limitations. thief also has no real DR skill (damage reduction) so they rely heavily on regen, and avoiding damage.

also from what ive seen (just saying, its what ive seen/heard) thieves are not nearly as unbalanced in tpvp as it is in spvp (or more specifically spvp hotjoin). fact is, thieves in tpvp can be effectively and severely countered.

as for the power of stealth, its more that its power is shifted, and becomes a real skill rather then a gimmick. i addressed stealth in detail tho in the main body, we really need the bugs surrounding stealth to be fixed before any real adjustments can be correctly made to it.

Yukishiro.8792:

It’s not that the design of the thief means spamming is BETTER. It’s that it encourages spamming by rewarding it even when the player is bad.

But initiative is broken way beyond that. It’s just a badly conceived system. A system which gives the thief very large burst for a short time followed by relatively little burst naturally overpowers the thief in 1v1 fights and underpowers them in group fights. If you balance to group fights they end up gibbing people too fast in solo fights, and if you balance to solo fights they are kitten in group combat.

There’s no way to really balance a system like that in PVP.

i actually addressed this already in this thread. while the reward isnt as good as a well played thief, the fact that it rewards is still a problem, spamming, the mindless action of it, should be discouraged…my only idea on that i also gave twice now. make it so when a thief uses the same move consecutively it increaes in initiative cost, this means that its not effecient to spam the same move, it will be discouraged, but the option is still there for when you really need it.

as for yoru main point tho, i think thats only true if you hold to the idea of high burst with high deficit, or “sitting around afterword” time. why can a thief not have potent burst (i said potent, no OP, unbalanced, or out of line) without becoming a sitting duck? just spitballing here of course.

Blazer Hellsing.9184:

Wolfe.3097:

LiuliRenai.3928:

Death Blossom still does 1500 direct damage (which can crit up to 3000) plus 1500 more from bleeding, for a pure direct damage build. To thieves that are addicted to 7k+ crits from backstab that doesn’t sound like much, until you take into consideration that it’s a fairly widespread AoE.

people wanna keep death blossom cuz they like the condition build, i do too, but it doesnt change that it makes D/D a unfocused weapon just like pistol mainhand

There is no such a thing as a “focused” weapon set! Pistol main hand fails because the design is bad, not because it is not focused. D/D is not focused either but works flawlessly.

The problem with Pistol and P/P in general is that the abilities are weak. P/P would be fixed easily to be viable for power crit and condition damage builds with the following changes:

1. Vital Shot instead of bleeding your target, should add 1 stack of vulnerability for 5 sec.
2. Body Shot instead of adding vulnerability, should add 3 staks of bleed for 8 sec. damage should be viable.
3. Unload execution should be faster and the damage should be increased by 15%-20%.
4. Head Shot’s damage needs to be increased by 200%-300%.
5. Black Powder’s initiative cost should be reduced by 1 initiative and it should also add poison with the original shot and every pulse.

With these changes P/P will be just as popular as D/D, S/P and Shortbow. As it stands now, P/P is the weakest settup for PvP… even S/D with Failing Strike is more effective duo to its lock down and harassing potential.

flawlessly…you cant use that word, just like perfect, and normal, they are non existing ideals humanity created thru there hopes and bias. there is nothing in this world that is flawless, D/D included :P

and your wrong, D/P is a focused weapon set, it has no bleeds to rely on, none of its damage is split. S/P and S/D as well.

and when i mean focused, im just talking about a weapon set trying to do 2 types of damage, it spreads it thin and weakens it as a whole.

@ hacks, actually the reason we spam 1-2 skills has nothing to do with the initiative cost of the other skills, its cuz the other skills are utility. black powder or headshot for example both do next to no damage. cloak and dagger does ok damage but is used to get into stealth.

fact is, the thief class is designed to use 1-2 skills for damage, the rest for other situations. the problem becomes in 8v8 zerg style play where nobody is really trying to do anything but damage eachother, then you develop this semi false stigma of all thieves being spammers.

if you dont take time to read the main body, its on you honestly, ill do my best to restate the information regardless, but i wont stop bringing it up either :P

define spammable? backstab cannot be spammed as it destealths you, pistol whip has to be paired with another spell on its every use in order to be viable. the only spec i can think of that really spams for thieves anymore is death blossom builds, and tahts condition damage not burst.

i cant really create a claim/counter argument for you as you have the base reasons for why the class is played the way it is currently wrong. it was correct when HS builds were being used, but now, we use our damage moves cuz they are our damage moves, we use our utility moves when they are needed. you can argue that that is a bad design, but that is the way the design is currently.

generally a thief weapon set has 6 moves, 5 utility, 1 damage (in case of dagger mainhand, damage move is while in stealth). some of his utility moves may do damage, but are never spammed because there design discourages it. This results in any situation where the thief can get away with “just using its damage move” then they will use that move.

like ive said to discourage that you can increase the cost of using a move back to back for everytime they use it consecutively, it would probably be easy to do compared to a complete revamp, and worst case scenario you will just get thieves who do an extra move in between there damage move.

the thief is designed to have the option of using an ability back to back tho.

Shukran.4851:

ok, i agree that game allow spamming and spamming is still too effective against a lot of players. but i don’t know if anet wants to rework a class.
so assuming the mechanic remains, what can be add to “balance” thief without make it weak?
because you know. we have 5 weaps skills, but only is effective and AA damage is not so high compared with hp and armor.

while there are many possible avenues im sure we can take to “fix” the spam issue, i did come up with one that i outlined earlier in this thread. basically, when you use the same move backtoback it increaes its ini cost. 3 ini HS>4 ini HS>5 ini HS etc

this will penalize spamming while still allowing a thief to use a skill back to back if its worth the increased cost.

hackks.3687:

Thief just has poor design IMO. It promotes skill spamming due to the high intiative costs on all other skills but the AA and even more so the spammables that everyone cries about. The class is extremely one dimensional as well – just deliver heavy burst. I’ve yet to see a thief play effectively without speccing for heavy front-loaded dmg – though I have seen plenty try.

The class design as a whole strikes me as counterintuitive to the design goals Anet had for PvP.

i take it your not into reading the main body? either way. I addressed the initiative system, specifically the aspect your addressing.

the class does have some bleed builds, mainly death blossom and pistol mainhand.

to a good degree a thief just doesnt perform well without speccing heavy burst which is also a problem.

but lets go to your claim

Claim: the design of the thief class is counterintuitive to Anets design goals of pvp (aka. they do too much damage?)
counter: Anet said they want fights to be fast paced, part of fast paced is dying quickly. tho quickly is a subjective term, its entirely possible (and with some specs certain) that thief has too much burst, tho they should have some so long as that maintains one of the “things” anet designed the thief around. burst and mobility.

now if your instead talking about the way ini works…i addressed that already.

Shukran.4851:

wow claimed every single aspect of thief op. basically:

Claim: thief OP
counter: remove thief from the game

some time after:
Claim: mesmer OP
counter: remove mesmer from the game.

and so on…

yes that is the mindset and mood i got from the forums earlier. sad to say, however, lets not clutter this thread with unhelpful information.

Yukishiro.8792:

The problem with thieves is the mechanic encourages button mashing and doesn’t really have a tradeoff in 1v1 because talents allow you to basically ignore the cost of spamming abilities for long enough to kill anyone in almost any circumstances.

There’s a reason the whines about thief are mostly 1v1. The class mechanic is just badly set up. I am not sure there is much that can be done to fix it because it’s fundamentally badly thought out. The only real solution is to do what wow did and slowly move the thief away from a meaningful initiative system and towards more stable, less bursty dps.

so your claim: thieves initiative system encourages button mashing
Counter: The problem isnt that it encourages, its that it allows. a smart player will realize hes more effective not spamming. The problem is the spammer player can still play his way and see a reward for his/her “effort”. its a problem, one that i am sadly not equipped to deal with. your suggestion would cause a massive re-write of thieves tho so if it does happen i dont think it will for a very long time.

your assumed claim: initiative regens too fast (when traited), as a result the thief class is not penalized for spamming as he essentially never runs out of initiative

counter: Is ini supposed to have the drawback of being unable to use moves just because the person “spammed” them? this is tricky honestly, i have no information that anet intends this, but lets say they do. the only way i can think of solving it is putting in a scaling factor to skills, everytime you use a skill back to back its ini cost increases. use HS, spend 3, use HS again, spend 4, etc. This should result in actual penalty for spam play without penalizing a good player too much.

edit: now that i think about it that would fix both issues, that would be very good!

LiuliRenai.3928:

Death Blossom still does 1500 direct damage (which can crit up to 3000) plus 1500 more from bleeding, for a pure direct damage build. To thieves that are addicted to 7k+ crits from backstab that doesn’t sound like much, until you take into consideration that it’s a fairly widespread AoE.

people wanna keep death blossom cuz they like the condition build, i do too, but it doesnt change that it makes D/D a unfocused weapon just like pistol mainhand

Claim: haste is OP
Counter: this isnt thief specific tho thieves have access to 3 quickness effects, one of which is profession specific and is a on use ability. To put it short, i agree, haste and other quickness effects make a fast paced game woefully gibtastic. it is fun attacking fast yes, but it needs adjusting clearly

Claim: Pistol Whip is OP
Counter: This one is tricky for me, and i dont even use the weapon set (dislike the slow autoattacks /shrug). coupled with quicknesss effects its absolutly unbalanced. without quickness PW has to be accompanied with another skill everytime its used in order for it to land. it has to be paired with immobilizes, stuns, roots, etc, otherwise the current form of pistol whip just doesnt cut it, anyone with half a brain could completly avoid it. But obviously there is a fine line from it being unreliable to it being OP. People have suggested changing PW and i think its probably the easiest method. turn the stun to a 1/4 second daze (effectively a spell interrupt) so it doesnt stun, remove the self root.

Claim: thieves have too much burst!
counter: lots of classes have “too much burst” at the moment. but yes there are certain specs (talked about already) and certain skills (also discussed already) that can contribute to this feeling, and its not entirely unfounded. Thieves are supposed to be bursty yes, but there has to be a balance between bursty, and too much burst. I think when things like quickness effects and the backstab glass cannon build are looked at, along with PW’s black and white tendency, we can come back to this and discuss it again, as once those are looked at, thief damage overall will certainly go down.

These are just the ones from the top of my head, im sure there are more, please feel free to debate my counters, add new information to the existing topics, or add you own claim that you have personally or you see a lot. I will keep track of this thread in my free time in hopes to provide polite debate. I hope you can do the same and not troll this well intentioned thread.

As well as a few other classes thief is one of the most complained about in spvp (strangely not that much in tpvp). But ive seen it get to a absurd degree on here, to the point where it honestly felt like the forum was filled with nothing but thief hate and every aspect of them was considered overpowered.

Id like us all to take a step back and instead of shouting L2P, your bad, or any other vitriol at eachother, we try to look at each claim and analyze it to find a mostly unbiased finding. Ill start by listing each claim i can think of off the top of my head, along with a counter point that you can either debate or agree to.

in turn anyone who puts up a claim ill either debate (politely) or agree to.

Claim: Stealth is overpowered
Counter: Stealth is bugged, mostly in favor of the thief. it has revealed debuff issues (the 3 second debuff that prevents a thief from re-stealthing immediatly). it has rendering issues (rogue not appearing but becoming targettable right away, only being visible for about a second, then going back into stealth). and hackers (theres quite a few at the moment not just on thieves). My counter is this, lets fix these stealth bugs before trying to gut stealth itself. fixing these bugs alone would amount to nerfs to stealth. however, if stealth was still over the top from a unbiased perspective, i do have a couple ideas

idea 1: atm a thief can chain stealth avoiding the revealed debuff at the expense of CD’s, this seems…well…cheesy. it doesnt take much skill or forethought to do it, and provides a advantage that the current stealth system tries to avoid to a extent. making it so the revealed debuff applies and puts you out of stealth after your timer runs out, so as being unable to chain stealth would be an idea

idea 2: the shadow arts minor trait increases stealth time by 1 second (to 4 seconds most of the time) ive seen people say 4 seconds too long, i dont agree but lets say im biased here, make it so this talent also increases the revealed debuff by 1 second? just an idea, not set in stone

Claim: Backstab builds are OP
Counter: there is a very specific build out there using very specific talents, it is a glass cannon backstab build to the fullest idea…and its largely unfun. every 45seconds to a minute this thief can nearly oneshot anyone, and is then a paperweight for the rest of that time. this spec, is unbalanced, and needs to be addressed. however, simply nerfing backstab damage will not address a core issue i think must be brought up. at the moment every thief builds glass cannon, nerfing backstab wont stop this, it will just make glass cannons weaker while making non glass cannons weaker still. resulting in…all thieves still playing soley glass cannons! rather, the adjustments should be laid out thru the traits and skills, things like assassins signet and signets of power are big offenders. naturally changing anything in pvp can have an effect on PVE and must be considered to a point.

you should have adjusted your title

profession power rankings in hotjoin spvp

CptCosmic.3156:

denying thread again.

I rolled one for spvp the moment a thief with quickness killed my engineer with soldiers amulet (which has toughness and vitality) out of stealth before he appeared because of the broken stealth animations. for spvp everyone can create a lvl 1 thief and abuse the current stealth reanimation together with the quickness buff. the damage is on such a high level with quickness that your target dies before he even sees you and I doubt that it is fun for my opponent that he dies before I even reappear from stealth because the stealth animation is broken. I also doubt that it is fair but I wont care, I will abuse it as long it exists. I also dont care about the “hacker, I report you” hate mails afterwards.

except a nerf, it will come and denying will not stop it.

thats not a nerf (well, i spose it is in a sense) but it more appropriatly would be a bug fix as its simply unintended.

as far as ini regen is concerned (again in pvp, sorry i have so little for pve) my ini regen traits/skills are as follows

minor trait Opportunist (20% chance per crit to regen 1 ini, 1 sec CD)

major trait infusion of shadow (skills that stealth you give you 2 initiative) this effectively reduces BP>HS cost from 9 to 7

major trait Patience (regain ini faster while in stealth), i may change this eventually if i feel its not needed

Utility skill Infiltrators Signet (regen 1 extra ini every 10 seconds), i may change this eventually also/instead of Patience depending how i feel, atm i enjoy its secondary use also even tho i have shadow shot.

between all that i have NO issues with my initiative, but i also play rather…calculatively? many times i wont BP>HS right away ill sit in the BP field autoattacking (your autoattack can do a surprising amount of damage, ive killed my share just from it) then time my HS for the tail end of BP’s duration.

i run a 30crit/30shadow/10 wherever you want (atm in poison) build, have about 19khp, 50% crit, 2880attack, dont remember defense, probably not great.

and bwillb makes a strong case against it in PVE, dredge being immune to blind hinders the spec somewhat.

Shooopa.5632:

I haven’t tried PvP yet, still working up to level 80 so my equipment and traits are up to par.

But I can see dagger/pistol working great against lone targets. Its only problem is it only works against single targets. If anyone else jumps into the fight, you need to either switch weapons or run away.

in pve maybe, in pvp not true, specially in team fights. it excels at 1v1, it isnt however its only strength, often times its greatest strength is its ability to support in group fights.

i can only speak pvp really.

but D/P has the strong autoattack of dagger, the strong backstabs, but also has superior group support because of black powder and headshot, able to completly fubar enemies execution attempts while all but gauranteeing your own teams.

besides if specced right you will regen ini fast enough that the cost doesnt really hinder you.

teh only thing you gotta watch out is ranged gibbing you while you work on the melee…but thats the same for D/D as well.

shadowshot is flawed but still helpful too.

this is taken in spvp matches.

in spvp its not as simple as kill the other guy

you get glory for lots of things.

a thief, excels at killing someone,a nd then is weak for a while. they have no real aoe (which is easily abused in spvp).

its simple, some of these classes can simply accumulate glory better/faster then others, this doesnt directly correspond to its power level as many players percieve power.

Mr Magoo.9065:

contrary to popular belief a widespread field of “nerf” cries does not signal great balance but horribly messed up balance way beyond just one class falling out of line.

thief and guardian need to be balanced asap. They require significant adjustments. Mesmers need to be balanced as well but this is one class where they have to be careful with since a lot of adversity players face is because of how much mesmers profit from clueless enemies and the general annoyance of fighting a mesmer.

your comment about mesmers can equally be applied to thieves and there stealth mechanics /shrug

but yes to the OP, every single kitten thing is OP