Guild Wars 2

What other profession nerfs? Did you see the buffs to the rangers? Ele ride the lightening was the only thing that got nerfed. They still heal big and their cantrips are as powerful as ever. Unless they plan on nerfing them later.
Let us see the trait buffs:
Destruction of the Empowered: 3% extra damage per boon on target.
1.It is deep in the discipline tree. You will have to sacrifice going into the Arms tree for the attack of opportunity.
2.The other buffed talent (just a silly combination..doubt anybody bursts faster than 7 seconds except hammer warriors on hammer all the time) is on the same line so you can only choose one.
3.Protection offers 33% damage reduction. To overcome protection which is up a LOT of the time on bunker classes..they will have to have 11 boons on them to mitigate it..
4. Does that mean I will receive even more damage when someone has retaliation up a lot of the time?
Now.. the only advantage I see to it is if you pick a boon heavy target in a group of enemies..say a guardian..does it mean it will give you a lot of increased damage on the rest of your targets? In that case..yummy.
I would have been happy if they gave us boon stripping like necros, mesmers and thieves. Thieves actually got one of their WEAPON attacks -not 30 points into a skill line trait-buffed to STEAL two boons and not simply strip them.
Dogged March:
33% duration reduction on movement impairing effects. I dunno but I think this is countered by condition duration increase by the attacking player so..and gaining regeneration? What good is regeneration if i’m kited to my death?
Also, you sacrifice either Embrace the pain or last stand which are both big in gaining adrenaline for bursting with Axe/hammer or for standing up to a cc combo or heavy cc class. I wish they had placed this somewhere else.
Who knows. With the calculated movement impairment reduction it might be good.
Signet of might:
Useless. CCs that go through will not knock back or down the blocking target. 100b lands 1/3 of the way through, only. Only reason I see it being used is for a big hit like Evis but even then..I usually check if someone is blocking before dropping it. I dunno if its worth it occupying one of my valuable traits just to make sure an ability goes through which it usually does.
Burst Mastery:
This might be good in fast bursting if you have a build to fill up the adrenaline fast giving you two bursts. The longer warriors stay in a fight the less chance of a survival against classes with fewer cooldowns and good escape abilities.
But then..will you be blowing abilities needlessly to fill your bar for a 2nd burst? Maybe if you were a full time hammer warrior it would be good.
Conclusion:
1.Boon hate sounds like its inferior to boon stripping. We are still falling behind other classes in dealing with boons.
2.Dogged mach is not that good. We sacrifice too much to get it. We are still being kited while other classes don’t have to be kited as much as us even with dogged march.
3.Signet of might is useless.
4. Burst mastery. Might be good,
I’m hoping they are keeping an eye on things and planing to intervene soon if possible and not wait several more months while working on PVE content.
Overall I think it is a good step forwards but we will see if it is enough. Got my doubts :o.

oZii.2864:

They can reapply the conditions so fast but they are almost wasting there time doing so. There is no cd on the reduction just the regen. Basically they can’t stop the warrior from reaching them now.

Don’t they have increased condition duration on their condition builds?

Oreoginal.1580:

Dogged March and Destruction of the Empowered are godlike. Add to that the +180 Power and Unblockable status from Signet of Might and the Warrior is back where it belongs. It made this class feel like a WARRIOR again.

Signet of might:
Useless. CCs that go through will not knock back or down the blocking target. It will not interrupt the channeled guardian heal.
100b lands 1/3 of the way through, only.
Only reason I see it being used is for a big hit like Evis but even then..I usually check if someone is blocking before dropping it. I dunno if its worth it occupying one of my valuable traits just to make sure an ability goes through which it usually does.
Check out the thread: Warriors post patch for the rest of the traits discussion :o

fost.9167:

If you read some of the other professions, some of them are a bit upset over their nerfs and changes so it might be that they didn’t want to overbalance the warrior with some of the fixes/nerfs going out.

Of course, I could be smoking crack too

fost.9167:

If you read some of the other professions, some of them are a bit upset over their nerfs and changes so it might be that they didn’t want to overbalance the warrior with some of the fixes/nerfs going out.

Of course, I could be smoking crack too

What other profession nerfs? Did you see the buffs to the rangers? Ele ride the lightening was the only thing that got nerfed. They still heal big and their cantrips are as powerful as ever. Unless they plan on nerfing them later.

Let us see the trait buffs:
Destruction of the Empowered: 3% extra damage per boon on target.
1.It is deep in the discipline tree. You will have to sacrifice going into the Arms tree for the attack of opportunity.
2.The other buffed talent (just a silly combination..doubt anybody bursts faster than 7 seconds except hammer warriors on hammer all the time) is on the same line so you can only choose one.
3.Protection offers 33% damage reduction. To overcome protection which is up a LOT of the time on bunker classes..they will have to have 11 boons on them to mitigate it..
4. Does that mean I will receive even more damage when someone has retaliation up a lot of the time?
Now.. the only advantage I see to it is if you pick a boon heavy target in a group of enemies..say a guardian..does it mean it will give you a lot of increased damage on the rest of your targets? In that case..yummy.

I would have been happy if they gave us boon stripping like necros, mesmers and thieves. Thieves actually got one of their WEAPON attacks -not 30 points into a skill line trait-buffed to STEAL two boons and not simply strip them.

Dogged March:
33% duration reduction on movement impairing effects. I dunno but I think this is countered by condition duration increase by the attacking player so..and gaining regeneration? What good is regeneration if i’m kited to my death?
Also, you sacrifice either Embrace the pain or last stand which are both big in gaining adrenaline for bursting with Axe/hammer or for standing up to a cc combo or heavy cc class. I wish they had placed this somewhere else.
Who knows. With the calculated movement impairment reduction it might be good.

Signet of might:
Useless. CCs that go through will not knock back or down the blocking target. 100b lands 1/3 of the way through, only. Only reason I see it being used is for a big hit like Evis but even then..I usually check if someone is blocking before dropping it. I dunno if its worth it occupying one of my valuable traits just to make sure an ability goes through which it usually does.
Guardians have line and circle of warding which interrupts blocking completly. Why can’t the signet of might be like that?They are even regular weapon skills..not utility ones..

Burst Mastery:
This might be good in fast bursting if you have a build to fill up the adrenaline fast giving you two bursts. The longer warriors stay in a fight the less chance of a survival against classes with fewer cooldowns and good escape abilities.
But then..will you be blowing abilities needlessly to fill your bar for a 2nd burst? Maybe if you were a full time hammer warrior it would be good.

Conclusion:
1.Boon hate sounds like its inferior to boon stripping. We are still falling behind other classes in dealing with boons.
2.Dogged mach is not that good. We sacrifice too much to get it. We are still being kited while other classes don’t have to be kited as much as us even with dogged march.
3.Signet of might is useless.
4. Burst mastery. Might be good,
5.Our elite -which is the equivalent to regular boons other classes have up more than us -can now be completely removed and added to the thieve’s aresnal using their regular weapon attack which has no cooldown.

I’m hoping they are keeping an eye on things and planing to intervene soon if possible and not wait several more months while working on PVE content.

Overall I think it is a good step forwards but we will see if it is enough. Got my doubts :o.

Aberrant.6749:

XII.9401:

I just get the feeling they made a huge mistake with the thief class and are unable to fix it without overhauling the whole class. Always the best defense to doing a bad class balance is to tell the customers to deal with it=l2p then working on super adventure box. That always goes down well..into pushing pvpers to other games.

The dev’s sounded like they did want to do a pretty large shift in thief gameplay in the last state of the game.

(I’m paraphrasing) Thief needs to have more ways of staying in the fight… only THEN can the damage can be lowered, but the damage will still be high (which sounds like a lot more play/fun for me and my opponent imo).

They also agreed that the thief needs to be able to reliably apply more conditions in cond specs.

I can’t wait ^^

Thief is just so very one trick pony as it is atm. Lower skilled players will keep dying to the one trick that thief is built for (and complain) and the more skilled players will easily counter it. It’s just too predictable… to the point where in a thief vs. thief fight you’ll often see one thief c&d off of the other while he’s still stealthed.

When on another class I can easily use that high predictability against them. I have SO many more options with how I wish to act/react on all my other characters and my opponent has far less of an idea to what will come next. They also have better options for team support/tactics than my thief. I hope thieves are changed to where they are more flexible with their abilities in the future as well.

Also… the people in charge of balance aren’t also the same people making events. They are two totally different teams. One team doesn’t go over to the other and say “Hey… we’re having problems with X… QUICK! Put out an event!” lol These events take a lot of time to put together and it’s not reasonable to assume they are at all related.

What one trick poney?

-Weapon skills with no cooldowns

-Multiple teleport hacks (shadowsteps) with NO range on returning or marking of where the shadowstep got anchored.
Repeated stealth.

-Being able to use abilities, Revive, finish AND attack while still remaining stealthed (pistol 5: Black powder then spam Heartseaker 3-4 times and STILL stay stealthed! Just..wow..)

-Instant group stealth. Have you ever seen a thief drop it before they die? They get downed while stealthed and keep teleporting arounf for 15 seconds. So you have to run around smacking the air for 15 seconds: whack whack whack whack whack whack -get the picture?- hoping they don’t revive without you killing them thus COMPLETELY bypassing the finishing system..nice..

-And the biggest advantage of all..completely bypassing the dodge system which is essential for the pvp. Can’t dodge what you can’t see.
As for the less skilled comment which is a veiled attempt at telling someone to L2P..have you ever played against a skilled player who utilizes the broken mechanics of a sword thief? Skill has nothing to do with it.

Next thing we will be saying a server should be able to grab the orb from a hacking player..Oh wait..they can’t and they it got removed from the game .

The fix is very simple..Thieves getting attack should be revealed. Like every other game in the multiverse. It was a grave oversight and should be corrected.

Evilek.5690:

XII.9401:

koroshi.2658:

So much fun, hope to meet you again demoman doomhammer!

He kept the pressure on me and didn’t allow me to attack him.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdIQY9mL91Y

Whaaat? Someone abusing broken class mechanics? Truly an inspiring video to watch. If only the warrior had a teleport hack..err..‘multiple shadowsteps’.

Sword thieves -or any thief- should try playing other classes where they don’t have multiple get out of jail cards. I suggest a mesmer. An easy transition for someone who relies on the class to win.

You should post it on other game forums so they can laugh as much as I do at the balanced thief class. Kudos to the class Dev team and the player.

Pokemon is the game for you man. This Warrior hiting this Thief with toughness gear for 50-60% HP. This Thief without these defensive skills would be dead in five seconds.
Think next time before you write such crap

What defensive tactics?

Oh you mean spamming stealth? Teleport hacks(shadowstep)? No cooldowns on weapon skills? Not being removed from stealth when hit? Conjuring stealth on command

It is a weak argument that thief players keep using: Oh if you remove stealth spam we can’t survive! If you remove Shadowsteps we can’t survive.

You already hit as hard as a warrior or more with less set up. Anyone who got hit by a thief can attest to that.

There is an awesome mechanic in the game called dodge. And yes..other classes have it..but they can’t use it if they can’t see the attack coming.

Play a warrior or an engy or a necro and see how long you survive with your current player skill.

Have fun with the broken OP mechanics till people start clamoring for a much needed balance patch after the private arenas/deathmatch is revealed. PvPers will be paying money then and the devs will have to listen and take class balancing more seriously.

koroshi.2658:

So much fun, hope to meet you again demoman doomhammer!

He kept the pressure on me and didn’t allow me to attack him.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdIQY9mL91Y

Whaaat? Someone abusing broken class mechanics? Truly an inspiring video to watch. If only the warrior had a teleport hack..err..‘multiple shadowsteps’.

Sword thieves -or any thief- should try playing other classes where they don’t have multiple get out of jail cards. I suggest a mesmer. An easy transition for someone who relies on the class to win.

You should post it on other game forums so they can laugh as much as I do at the balanced thief class. Kudos to the class Dev team and the player.

bhagwad.4281:

I wonder how much I’ll be willing to pay for a custom arena?

Let’s see. I would think it worthwhile to spend say 10 silver to create a custom arena lasting for a few days.

I hope it’s not much more expensive than that.

I say make them pay as much as possible. If they are happy paying for a poorly balanced and largly ignored pvp content compared to the PVE one, I say they are happy paying a lot.

Confusion and retaliation are two things that should have never been implemented.

A condition which kills you if you use any ability so you should sit there waiting patiently while getting DPSed or run away?

A condition which destroys you if you attack your target so you have to cower in a corner till it’s gone?

Wow..

The only people who defend this silly mechanic are people who play classes that use it or who have heavy condition removal. The remainder can go get farmed.

Kupinoodle.7194:

Apolo.5942:

Chaith.8256:

This is a Guild Wars 2 Elementalist, not a Dungeons & Dragons Wizard.

Given the massive failure of this games pvp, specially considering its a sequel to GW1, i would not be too proud of that. Doing something different, makes it different, not good.

Chaith.8256:

I think the real problem is Elementalist & Warrior are the only professions that have viable and semi-viable full time melee options, respectively.

Warrior viable melee builds? i take it you dont pvp much?

But it is a different good. The concept is awesome.
You like a class and you can chose a variety of play styles.
The problem is the numbers, not the class concept.

The concept of having broken classes such as thief is ‘Awesome!’?

The concept of having OP classes is ‘Awesome’?

Wish I could filter out certain players’ posts.

Shananigans.8412:

Almost every profession has access to swiftness, gap-closers, crowd control, cripple, chill, or immobilize, not to mention blinks. This is not a big issue. If they kite away from you off a point you win the point, if they stay on point the points are small enough that you can easily attack them, with the exception of foefire mid. Of course If its a team fight an they don’t need to stay on point, work with you team to coordinate c/c and if stab is up use immobilizes.

./thread

Yep, as a warrior you can easily escape snares /sarcasm off. You have to spec in a certain way to close gaps efficiently when having snares on you.

Also, since your melee as a war, you can always stay in the point and get conditions to death?

You can’t work with your team as a war if your the only one at a point. Are you suggesting warriors should tag along with other non crappy classes to be efficient?

Regardless of what they claim: Actions speak louder than words.

Months into the game with no significant changes to the game and broken mechanics bordering on hacking persist.

They pull of the people on pvp balance into PVE content. They decided to cash off of the PVE crowd and not the pvp ones hence why your ignored.

If it was truly 2 people, then months since the launch of the game a lot more balancing should have happened.

Its pvp. Anet went with the pve crowd so they didn’t focus on making cash off of pvp players. Look for ESO.

Aberrant.6749:

Svarty.8019:

I saw this and lolled. Unbelievably the devs actually try to justify the thief: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCUvIrH2BlU#t=1h28s
That stunned silence at 1h 2m 19s made me laugh my kitten off.

See… I took that more as them all thinking “they just need to l2p against these classes then… why would we balance for such low skill level gameplay?”

playandchill.3908:

When i want to own someone in WvV,

I log my thief.

Most absurd burst in the game (if you know how to precast c/d)

Once you get better at other classes you can own WvW-ers on many more classes than just thief. I do it equally as well on all 4 of my 80’s. On my guard I pre-cast RoW to trap them then rotflstomp which is a lot of fun. It’s just different playstyles/tatics.

I just get the feeling they made a huge mistake with the thief class and are unable to fix it without overhauling the whole class. Always the best defense to doing a bad class balance is to tell the customers to deal with it=l2p then working on super adventure box. That always goes down well..into pushing pvpers to other games.

Ken Virgo.6084:

It’s kinda sad that some players get upset because they cant hit the PvP i win button. No class is perfect. not warrior,guardian,mesmer,thief,ranger,elementalist,necromancer, or engineer. Everyone is going to make mistakes OR sacrifice one part of the class for the other. Learn to play the class and get a build/class that works for YOU.

No class is perfect because no class sprouts wings out of its kitten However, there are OP classes. Everyone knows right off the bat that Mesmers, Guardians and thieves -the holy trinity- are OP.

It’s not about damage. It’s about broken mechanics. Mesmers have too many escape mechanisms while having good burst damage or condition damage. Have you ever fought a heavy confusion mesmer or a good shatter one? I doubt it if your rank is below 40.
Thieves have ZERO cooldown on their ability..only class in this game that has that. They can Teleport instantly for ranges >1800, they can stealth repeatedly and they can stomp while stealthed on command while other classes need stability to do so. Oh..I forgot to mention they can’t be popped out of stealth at all.

We are talking about a kitten class and not how cute and cuddly certain people’s char warriors are. I’m afraid this isn’t the RP forum.

Please don’t post opinions based on little to no pvp experience. The original posters is 100% right and will be validated by changes applied to the warrior in the upcoming months -or years-. If you were correct about your post..why is Anet planing to buff the warrior? Hmm..

Picking on a warrior in GW2 is like picking on an infant. Hope your proud of yourself!

PowerBottom.5796:

Don’t get me wrong, it’s cool that ANet makes sth. special for Halloween, Christmas and even 1st of April, but c’mon ANet – if you can knock out stuff like that every few months, why are we (the PvP-Community) still waiting for Custom Arenas, Observer-Mode, GvG (and/or other Game-Modes), a decent Matchmaking-System and basically everything a successful PvP-Game just NEEDS to have nowadays?

Just let those geniuses from PvE work at PvP for a few weeks and PvP will be good to go!

Really: Enough is enough!

PVE customer base pays more to the BL Trading post. More people pve than spvp in this game. If you were running the company with limited resources wouldn’t you rather focus on the group that nets you more profit?

Sadly that is the current state judging from all the PVE content added in the past months. Better luck elsewhere for pvp is all I can say! I know I stopped giving them my money and moving to greener pastures now.

There will be no significant change to the non-existant pvp aspect of Wvw because Anet encourages zerging for two big reasons:

1.AOE is limited to 5 ppl. This favors PVErs/zerglings.
2.Downed state.You can gank a group of 10 with your 5 and even with the AOE cap you down 8 people and they would all rez off a single npc guard or random mob close by. It also encourages zerging as they can rez each other.

I’m on T1 and there is no small group action. Anyone who tells you otherwise is someone who goes out, finds a small fight then gets rolled by a zerg back into his waypoint to repeat the same pattern all evening. Half the time you are running away from zergs and hiding.What kinda game is this?

The solution is very simple: remove the cap on AOE Damage but limit the AOE buffs to 5 max to prevent favoring zergs with zero skill.

This will also give the underdog servers a chance to fight back if they are better at organizing themselves. Punish mindless clumping and reward tactics and planing. They probably are by now since the zegling upper tier servers have grown complacent and PVEish.

WvW in GW2 is PVE. If someone tells you the majority of people like zerging that is 100% true..know why? Because the previous majority wanted the same..found it boring and left the game. So you have a new majority that favors it again and the same pattern will happen till people stop WvWing.

There is absolutely zero benefit from WvWing:
1.Zerging.
2,Badge rewards: Faster to farm the mats or do dungeon runs or craft etc.
3.No good skins and even if there were that is not enough to make people grind hours through zerging once they get bored with it.
4.Title rewards..yea..ok..have fun with zerging for a useless title that any zergling can achieve.
5.Abilities gained from WvW ranks: only affect NPCs and sieging. i.e.PVE. Yay..

Switch to anothe game if you want a challenge or semblance of open world pvp. Anet will never change this and hopefully Elder scrolls online won’t be carebearish as much.

Vv W.7821:

It’s not like they can read a good suggestion and put it in game within the hour… these things take time. I’m really getting tired of all these impatient posters who want everything their way before they can refresh the page to see new posts…

If you don’t like the current state of WvW then don’t play it in it’s current state. Things change over time, try it again later.

What takes time? There isn’t anything they are WILLING to implement that will make WvW fun.

Anet encourages zerging for two big reasons:
1.AOE is limited to 5 ppl. This favors PVErs/zerglings.
2.Downed state.You can gank a group of 10 with your 5 and even with the AOE cap you down 8 people and they would all rez off a single npc guard or random mob close by. It also encourages zerging as they can rez each other.

I’m on T1 and there is no small group action. Anyone who tells you otherwise is someone who goes out, finds a small fight then gets rolled by a zerg back into his waypoint to repeat the same pattern all evening. Half the time you are running away from zergs and hiding.What kinda game is this?

The solution is very simple: remove the cap on AOE Damage but limit the AOE buffs to 5 max to prevent favoring zergs with zero skill.

WvW in GW2 is PVE. If someone tells you the majority of people like zerging that is 100% true..know why? Because the previous majority wanted the same..found it boring and left the game. So you have a new majority that favors it again and the same pattern will happen till people stop WvWing.

There is absolutely zero benefit from WvWing:
1.Zerging.
2,Badge rewards: Faster to farm the mats or do dungeon runs or craft etc.
3.No good skins and even if there were that is not enough to make people grind hours through zerging once they get bored with it.
4.Title rewards..yea..ok..have fun with zerging for a useless title that any zergling can achieve.
5.Abilities gained from WvW ranks: only affect NPCs and sieging. i.e.PVE. Yay..

Switch to anothe game if you want a challenge or semblance of open world pvp. Anet will never change this and hopefully Elder scrolls online won’t be carebearish as much.

oZii.2864:

For solo roamng on Warrior you kind of have to take certain weapon sets to get the mobility or disengage quickly. Compared to thief that gets mobility in the and stealth(though a few sets have some i.e. dagger and heartseeker, bow) Warrior doesnt really have much for mobility in its utilities except bullscharge. If your looking to solo roam on warrior you can do it you just have to get a feel about what fights you can jump into vs a certain class.

Agree with OP that movement condis are the crux of warriors atm but it is getting addressed. You can read the devs post in the sPvP thread in this forum. My guess is a buff to SIO. Right now I run Sig of Stamina and it pretty much gets the job done but I also run sig mastery if I didnt have sig mastery I think I would kind of be forced into a shout build. You can run resorative strength also to help with those specific condi’s that impair movement. I don’t run Shake it Off cause well its 1 condi o.O

Translation:
Get ready to run away.
Pick the fights your guranteed to win: lowbies or someone who is almost dead.
Zerg.
Roll another class till they fix the warrior in 6-8months time.

Unlike every other class in the game, Glass cannon is not viable since you can’t mitigate damage or get rid of conditions/snares well. Tanky isn’t because you won’t be able to kill a good player in a timely manner. Eventually youl be zerged while stretching a long pointless tanky fight.

Every other class in the game can get away with being a glass cannon with good escape mechanims/dmg mitigation or tanky with good damage output.

Currently warriors are neither of the above. Sugar coat is as much as you like but you can achieve twice as good results with half the efforts in other classes.

Hate to break it to ya, but if you are playing any kinda pvp then warrior isn’t the class for you. You will just be frustrated at how every other class in the hands of an equally or worse skilled player will trump you. Its currently the weakest on 1v1 or 1v2 of any class. Till Anet applies the upcoming changes -which judging by the timeline for the useless nerfing to thieves, it will take a few months-.

Keeping that in mind:

If you’re going solo in WvW -many if not all classes will trump you if properly built and geared with semi-decent players-:

GS+Axe/shield. 0/20/30/0/20, full zerker. Someone posted their build with videos on the forums on Guru. He gets all the credit. I tried it for a bit of time and it is a lot of fun. Obviously you blow against OP classes played by semi-decent players.

Great for getting away from zergs. Couple it with sword/warhorn from your bag when traveling and every class has trouble chasing you, almost.
Good mobility, dmg mitigation with shield 5.
Burst is 100b and using GS3 before 100b finishes, quickly switch to axe shield then either shield 4 then burst or burst axe right away. Most people have a hard time coming back from it.
bulls charge, shake it off and endure pain.
Requires a bit of smart play but is balanced.
Need food buffs to compliment it.

Pros:
You aren’t squishy
No frenzy involved.
Good escape from snares.
Good damage mitigation.
Great burst.
Ok mitigation of conditions.
Good for downed targets: 100b and GS 3 on downed people to kill them without risking a lengthy stomp.

Cons:
No chain CC. Gotta rely on smart timing to take down better classes and even then meh.
No good sustained aoe dps/cc.
No frenzy stomping.
Good gap closer.

For group runs:
Axe/mace and hammer
0/30/30/10/0 (10 is optional)
Gear is a mix of knight and valk with zerker jewlery and weapons. If you are going full zerker make sure you don’t go in 1st unless you have endure pain OP.
Frenzy, bulls and endure pain. You get another frenzy when opponent is 25% health for a total of 8-9 seconds frenzy. Yes I know its nerfed but you unload mace 5, switch to hammer and chain cc.
the 10 is to get immobilze on snares i.e. your number 3 on axe and hammer. Good since it basically is a stun for 1 second as far as the opponent is concerned.
Problems: No stability or condition removal. Overcome this by guardian in group for stability and condition reduction runes and food. You get a total of 60% condition duration reduction.
It basically relies on the party to give you stability and condition removal while you apply AOE damage with axe and AOE CC with mace and hammer. Very good in a nice group.

PRos:
Good for applying pressure on a single target with chain cc. Thus good for farming PVErs..I mean..WvWers..
Heavy group dps and AOE/ chain CC. With group support, I often find my long frenzy going well into hitting the downed players. You also have a bit of toughness from the gear with 2 endure pains -the reactive one is 2seconds i think, bugged-.
Frenzy stomping.

Cons:
Opportunistic or group reliant.
No escapes. Rely on party.
One trick pony if you are solo. You burn through your abilities and one stun break can screw you up.
Bad gap closer
Bad against conditions. Overcome this by food+ runes. Rely on party.
No stability. Rely on party.
Bad against classes with good stability: Ranger. Switch targets or your group necro can rip it off him.

Boulderbolg.3460:

How has no culling effected your small roaming group? Last night we decided to roam in the enemy territory as we always do, and it felt like we ended up running away from zergs nearly the entire time. While getting zergs to chase you all around might be good for our side’s meta, it was frustrating and boring. I think that kiting is going to have to be a big addition to the way we play, rather than going balls deep into the tail of a zerg. How has your small roaming group been effected by no culling, and what adjustments is your group making?

If you want small scale wvw this is not your game. You will not succeed against bigger zergs for the following reasons.

Here is why:

1.AOE only affects 5 people max. This way, bigger numbers with less skill will always trump you (if they are of close enough level and gear).
This rewards bad players who don’t even pan their cams around with zero situational awareness since they can get away without being hit.

2.The downed state. Zergs are able to rez their downed quickly or rally off an NPC guard or a single player. Thus you can wipe 8 out of 10 with your group of 5 and they can all rally off an NPC caught in the cross fire. This rewards bad players and punishes good ones. If your a good player and your downed your skill won’t help you since people will just throw damage on you or try and finish you -can’t hold off 5 people trying to finish you-.

3.You get less badges from 5mans vs. zerging if you know how to apply your AOE dps. The fights that you can win in wvw as a 5man are few and far inbetween making your efforts in hunting down badges or points less effective than zerging.

And overall there are no good rewards for wvw:
1.Skill points: Effective against NPCS or inanimate objects..aka..PVE reward..nothing to do with pvp.
2.Badges give you gear which you can get from karma vendors, crafting and dungeons. While this is a welcome reward for people grinding in Wvw, It is still not as good since the skin is boring and is the same for all the WvW gear rewards.
3.Titles:You can achieve those faster by zerging/PVE in wvw:towers/camps/garrisons and thus are not an indicator to the person’s skill just to the time spent playing.

The above favors mindless zerging and lack of awareness/organization.

Sadly WvW is PVE and not PvP.You are in for a big disappointment if you think you will be effective against anything more than 7-8 bad players or in PvE..i mean..camp captures, ninja tower captures and sentries.. the usual boring pve stuff.

The only way to win against bigger zergs is to flank them and burst hard and have a good escape strategy -mesmer portal- or have each individual in the team ready with their escape mechanism. Even then the downed players will be rezzed unless you are frenzy or stealth stomping. That or heavy kiting through choke points-.

Hopefully the Open world PvP in upcoming games won’t favor bad players or zerging.

Shinobi.3240:

Hiho! You probably saw a combination of this.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Disabling_Shot_

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Withdraw

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Feline_Grace

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Vigorous_Recovery

Take a look:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSmdR74mQkM

Best regards!

Another cheap and broken build for the thief. Why am I not surprised? Someone should make a thread about all the cheap thief builds with videos =). I’m impressed by the balance in the patch for the thief class..

Daecollo.9578:

Jaytee.9513:

They should make the reveal debuff happen whether an attack happens or not as this prevents chain stealthing which effectively allows a thief to “reset” a fight when they feel they are losing. All other characters face risks when engaging in combat while the thief can effectively attack then stealth away. Combined with all the escape mechanisms a thief has ie. shadow returns, crippling traps, caltrops etc. it technically allows a thief to troll other players which i feel is detrimental to player enjoyment……

Really many other games had stealth as an ability but it always came with a penalty, ie slow move speed, high cooldowns, increased vulnerability etc never additional buffs like how GW2 makes it – exactly the opposite (higher speed, regeneration, condition removal, increased damage). IMHO too much benefit is stacked upon an already OP skill which make it impossible for opponents to effectively target you. Its like giving a warrior endure pain with a 10 sec CD. Really people need to think about the two sides of the coin……..

Elementalist can do the same, and get away a lot faster.

Untrue. I can plan my chain cc and burst dps because I actually SEE them when I want to attack.

Thieves: can’t hit what i can’t see 50% of the time. Single burst on them? Immediately use sword number 2. Instant stun breaker and get out of jail card. Zero cooldown. Zero cast time. If you are a thief and can’t get away easily..I dunno what to say.

Yep. Thief class is still as broken and cheap as ever. No significant change at all in this patch regarding thieves.

Every other class was affected by this nerf. The warriors were hurt the most since a lot use it.

Thieves have MANY other viable alternatives and if all else fail..restealth restealth resteathl and use the weapon. abilities that have no cooldowns unlike every other class in the game.

If you thought the thief ‘nerfs’ in this patch were significant..I’m afraid you were relying too much on handicaps.

This thread should be closed.

It only demosntrated that Anet is very slow to react to balancing its product (3 and a half thousand replies on this thread and still no balance to the thief is made).

Even if they try and balance the class it is too late for the following:

1.The class has many OP features and I’m sure they will address one or two and the players will simply gravitate towards other OP builds because..well..the class is broken. Example: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Infiltrator%27s_Strike will not be fixed. You can drop it INSTANTLY and WITHOUT any indicator to where it is to anchor u in a spot like a mesmer, walk into a melee, and if the fight goes bad then use it to teleport you back INSTANTLY for more than 1800 range ..oh..and it breaks stun.. Good luck balancing stealth with things like that around..esport..wow..

2.As a consumer of a product, if a company demonstrates that it is too slow or incapable of addressing flaws in the product in a timely fashion, it is an indicator that it will repeat the same performance with other products, e.g. balancing ele, mesmer, guardian etc.

3.It is basically too late. By the time they are done with the thief class and start thinking about another class, other mmorpgs with a bigger fan base such as The Elder Scrolls Online will be out.

MMorpgs are not something new anymore and customers patience with imbalances is much less than before. Hope Elder scrolls doesn’t make the same mistake.

Yep. Ran into this tonight.

Kinda silly that this went this long broken and unfixed. I remember the time when someone said they should make spvp an e-sport..good times..good times, lol.

I actually thank Anet for the thief class.

By demonstrating that it take them 6 months to GET to balancing the thief, they display their approach to other imbalances. So maybe balancing the guardian and mesmer would take what..another year? 2 years? How about the Ele? meh throw in a 3rd year.

This way I know I shouldn’t invest anymore into this game and will be anticipating other Mmorpgs that will do a faster and better job at addressing imbalances.

Have fun with a plummeting player base or with them returning for future Anet products. Players have a limited patience that was abused, unfortunately.

Same problem here.

Simple fixes:

1.Any damage to a stealthed opponents: reveals the stealthed person..just like every other mmorpg that was, is and ever will be.

2.Any action performed during stealth breaks it.

3. Stealthing of any sort should cause initiative usage. Enough to prevent restealthing over and over. This isn’t thief wars or hide-and-go-seek.

Or

Introduce cooldowns on stealth in general..no need to stealth 4 times in a fight instantly with only one stealth ability using initiative..dagger off hand thief: can spec into stealth upon stealing, can stealth when healing, can group stealth and can dagger 5 to stealth. Only dagger 5 in this situation uses initiative..and it can be used twice in a row.. kinda silly, really..

4.Bow 5 and sword 2 -and its equivalent- should have high initiate usage with a short range for sword 2 maximum 1200 range. Its time that the thief class should stay and pay the price if it messes up like every other class – eles excluded..their escapes are just too silly as well if anyone ran into a half decent ele -

Or simply..introduce cooldowns on the abilities like Aaaaaall the other classes in the game?

There are -presumably- more than two people doing the balancing as eluded to previously. SEVEN months have passed with the most pressing class imbalance being thieves as noted by 64k reads to this thread and 60+ pages of replies and still nothing has been done.

We’ve reached a point of heavy customer dissatisfaction and the slow reaction to balancing the thief is an indicative of things to come, unfortunately. The players patience is not infinite and with new MMOs looming in the horizon, time is running short.

What an OP build with ascendant gear can do:

The gear used:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/elementalist/Guide-Mastering-the-D-D-ele-2-16-12#post655850

Most of the armor can be bought off auction house or crafted, except the superior monk runes and ascended gear.
Armor/Accessories
Full knights (Power, precision, toughness) armor
Knights accessories with valkyrie jewels (Power, precision, toughness + critical damage, vitality, power)
Knights daggers (Power, toughness, precision)
Karka Shell (http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Ancient_Karka_Shell)
Ascended Triforge (http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Triforge_Pendant_
Ascended Solaria/Lunaria (http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Solaria,_Circle_of_the_Sun)
Ascended power,toughness, crit dmg (http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Rurik%27s_Royal_Signet_Ring)
Ascended Back
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Symon%27s_History_of_Ascalon
Weapons:
-Daggers:
2 Knights Daggers (power, precision, toughness)
1x Superior rune of battle (3stacks of might/attunement swap — attunement swap=weapon swap), 1x superior rune bloodlust (+10 power per kill)
Optional 3rd knights dagger when you have 25 stacks of bloodlust
1x superior rune of force (5% damage)
Alternate daggers used can be PVT, clerics, and berserker stats

slow clap for the great balance in WvW and sPvP Can’t WAIT to see what the holy trinity (Mesmers, Guardians and thieves) can do with ascendant gear! Joy!

kenshinakh.3672:

XII, your first point is not right. Infiltrator’s arrow is 900 yrd. Only shadowstep is 1200 yards.

Actually, you’re mixing up a lot of things. The survivability and highly stealthy and mobile thieves are considered your “bunker” thieves. The damage they dish out is comparable to other bunker builds. They can’t take hits like some other bunkers, so they rely on dodging and stealthing for damage migitation.
Now, your high damage, glass cannon thieves, they only got high damage. They’re extremely squishy and can die quite easily. They don’t have the same mobility and stealth as your “bunker” thieves. They can try, but if they do, they can’t attack and it leaves them vulnerable afterwards.

It’s mind boggling on how much… information you have wrong in your post. If you want changes to thieves, then you need to really know the class and know how to beat them.

Do you guys ask yourselves why there are people who have no problem with countering thieves? That’s a serious question for people here demanding some rather class breaking changes. Several times people who play different classes also have said they don’t have an issue with thieves, and yet people choose to ignore them and toss their advice aside as if you’re saying “I don’t need your advice. I’m good enough. It’s just the class is OP.”

I mean, come on!. Read up on what these past 55 pages are about… If there are people who can beat thieves, then that means thieves can be fought on an even foot by other classes.

Sword ability number 2. Did you check the range on it? I suggest everyone goes into sPvP , press number 2 on the sword, walk around a bit then press it again..notice the insane range.

As for the so called excuse for repeated stealth as a ‘bunker build’ -funny twist on a broken mechanic, btw!- well..you can’t hit what you can’t see..but you can hit other bunker classes and interrupt them.. it is like a walking into a ring with a boxer that goes invisible every 6 seconds or even more given some traits and abilities -remember..stealth has no cooldown! Crazy..i know!- Would you rather fight a boxer that you can see or someone that sucker punches you every time?

I love how thief players try and discredit logical and rational breakdown of their class by the usual L2P and your wrong! you must be wrong! and this great one: Your mixing things.. When someone puts a detailed reply I would expect a good reply in turn..not your mixing things up . Awesome argument to my post, btw.

As for people defeating thiefs..anyone ever played against a good player who exploits a broken class? Its not the same as the other 90% of thieves. You also will be pigeon holed into certain builds and gear to try and survive one class.

Why should ALL the players take certain builds and wear certain gear and ruin their enjoyment to try and survive against your broken class?

I think the obvious answer is balance a single broken class and not re-design all the other classes in the game to accommodate its broken mechanics. FOTM players will find something else to exploit..no worries. Not everyone believes in a fair challenge.

We keep seeing these constructive replies and feedback by non-broken class players and all we see from those playing it are

Here is a simple summary:

A thief class can:

-Teleport instantly multiple times and huge distances: range>1200 using a weapon ability and a slotted talent ability… Thieves are the ONLY class that does that at this frequency and ease. There is zero indication of where the thief will teleport back to as opposed to a mesmer who HAS to slot a TRAITED ability to do this ONCE on a long cooldown..sword ability number 2 breaks stun and removes a condition AND teleports back….no cooldown..can be used repeatedly.
I can use sword ability number 2 to create a safe spot , switch to my daggers and start a fight..goes bad? simply switch back to sword and hit sword number 2..breaks stun and teleports a huge distance back.
Hell..I can go into a zerg..kill someone..and get out scott free with zero penalty.

-Can disengage from combat to escape being hit and they can do this multiple times with multiple abilities that give stealth. Stealth is available at hand at any time. Thieves are the ONLY class that does this.

-Can use the same ability repeatedly. They can stun you repeatedly using the SAME ability. Every other class has a cool down on the majority of their abilities. Thieves are the ONLY class that does not.

-Can dish out major DPS. No degree of toughness will save you. If you don’t spec into some way to get a protection buff to combat this single broken class then you are out of luck. And since they are the only class you can’t see them coming or opening on you..using your dodge skills won’t help you. I can see a warrior coming or a mesmers clone running towards me but not a thief. You also can’t time your dodges since they restealth so many times and thus rendering an important mechanic in the game useless..Notice that this is ONLY with the thief class..No other class has this insane access to restealthing.

-Can disengage and engage from and into any fight with zero penalty. See the above.

-Can travel faster than any class.

-Can stealth-finish downed opponents avoiding the majority of downed abilities and minimizing interruption from other enemy players since they can stealth from several skills easily which are almost always up. they can stomp a downed player at any time using this. Other classes have to slot a stability trait, mist form, elixir abilities or quickness then blow those valuable traits to stomp as opposed to the thief class which can stealth from multiple abilities.

The steal ability -F1- has a cool down. However, you can use it on an enemy to steal an ability and not use that ability. In an upcoming fight you can unload this ability and quickly spam steal again to unload a 2nd ability..and no..the first stolen ability stays for a long time..no worries of it wiping. This is a way to go around the cooldown of the ability.

Anyone who tells you that initiative is what is balancing the thief class is ignorant or trying to protect his broken class. Initiate regenerates rapidly, regenerates in stealth and you can spec into abilities that replenish it as well as increasing the total reservoir of initiative.

If you have not played the thief class then you are missing on an insanely OP class. Compared to the thief class every other class is miles behind. I advise everyone to try and play this class as the learning curve is easier than all the other classes and the reward and gain is much higher.

Obviously there is a huge imbalance that has gone unattended for a long time.

Lets just hope that some developers in certain MMORPGs are not repeating past mistakes they did with their past games of exploiting broken and OP classes for their enjoyment on the expense of the majority of the paying customer base.

I am now very wary of any Anet future games as -as has been demonstrated in this game- issues of imbalance are left unattended for unacceptable prolonged periods of time for whatever reason. Why go through this with future Anet products? Better spend my hard earned money elsewhere.

It is just mind boggling that this broken class has gone so long unattended. Not even WoW or SWTOR was this slow at fixing a class. Let us hope this is fixed before people leave for other games with a sour taste in their mouth for Anet balance issues.

This thread is 55 pages long and has been running for months. I am not sure how much more feed back is needed..

Maugetarr.6823:

XII.9401:

Maugetarr.6823:

XII.9401:

Hit for 9968 damage in under a second in the opening attack.
5217 from steal alone.
Full exotic toughness armor and weapons engineer. Full exotic vitality jewelry.

Health pool is 21382 so almost half my health dropped in the opening attack. And no..no elixir U used =).

So basically I started the fight with half my health gone. So much for toughness/vitality countering the thief’s ‘nerfed’ DPS.

Pic attached.

So you started the fight with right around the thief’s healthpool? Sounds like he started the fight off by evening the odds.

No..I started the fight with the same health pool of a glass cannon who has more dps than me based on his build and gear.
I started the fight with the same health pool as the thief who can stealth to get away from being focused.
So..no..it wasn’t evening the odds..it was using a broken class. Good try, though! (not..)

So in essence..your punished for using toughness/vitality gear and your punished for using glass cannon gear. i.e. What thief players depend on.

Its entertaining seeing how thief players argue and defend the broken mechanics. Reminds me of someone drowning who will grab unto anything =D .

Please fix the handicap mode class..how many pages in this thread do we need ?

Well assuming your screenshot was using the same build, after supply crate was dropped, they would be stunned, then immobilized by the net turret. then you could further immobilize them with the glue shot. Assuming they ever got to you after you loaded them up with every condition, they would then be hurt by confusion, not to mention access to blind and knockback on the flamethrower, plus at least 2 dodges, and then even after all that, elixer s which would negate the last few heartseekers of a thief probably desperately hitting 2 since you’ve blown through most of his 13000 health with no condition removal if he truly was a glass cannon. it is very hard for a snared D/D thief to do much.

That would be a nice rosy world where you actually compete fairly against the thief class!

so:
A.Why should My class start the fight against a thief class with half my health gone.
B.I should have thought of all of that..I mean I have it all set up and stuff..I bet you I could have unloaded all of that in less than a second and dropped the thief’s health to half or zero if he was a glass cannon. Sadly..I can’t do that much DPS in a second.

Blink blink and your dead..welcome to Thief wars 2~!

If your CCed or hit during stealth you should pop out right away..period. Its ridiculous to stay stealthed. ANY action should break stealth. There should be a balance to the stealth ability.

Maugetarr.6823:

XII.9401:

Hit for 9968 damage in under a second in the opening attack.
5217 from steal alone.
Full exotic toughness armor and weapons engineer. Full exotic vitality jewelry.

Health pool is 21382 so almost half my health dropped in the opening attack. And no..no elixir U used =).

So basically I started the fight with half my health gone. So much for toughness/vitality countering the thief’s ‘nerfed’ DPS.

Pic attached.

So you started the fight with right around the thief’s healthpool? Sounds like he started the fight off by evening the odds.

No..I started the fight with the same health pool of a glass cannon who has more dps than me based on his build and gear.
I started the fight with the same health pool as the thief who can stealth to get away from being focused.
So..no..it wasn’t evening the odds..it was using a broken class. Good try, though! (not..)

So in essence..your punished for using toughness/vitality gear and your punished for using glass cannon gear. i.e. What thief players depend on.

Its entertaining seeing how thief players argue and defend the broken mechanics. Reminds me of someone drowning who will grab unto anything =D .

Please fix the handicap mode class..how many pages in this thread do we need ?

Hit for 9968 damage in under a second in the opening attack.
5217 from steal alone.
Full exotic toughness armor and weapons engineer. Full exotic vitality jewelry.

Health pool is 21382 so almost half my health dropped in the opening attack. And no..no elixir U used =).

So basically I started the fight with half my health gone. So much for toughness/vitality countering the thief’s ‘nerfed’ DPS.

Pic attached.

LOCO.1785:

Pestilence.3184:

they are stupidly overpowered, i have a few thiefs in my guild that can decimate a 15-20 man zerg between them. i saw 1 in particular today jump the walls at hills in wvw and fought 8 guys at least dropping them to the downed state and continuing to go through the rest in his way as peeps were jumping the walls to finish them off, so tell me that aint OP. A “Tank” or “Bunker” build cant even do this so why can a class thats pure dmg take a grp of guys all targeting him and still get the better of them. IMO they need a reduction in dmg dealt.

and in reply to the guy above asking for evidence he needs to scour you tube there’s plenty on there

We only need evidence for outlandish claims such as yours.

I keep posting them. Check my posts. Pics, Videos etc. I encourage everyone to post screenshots and videos displaying the broken mechanics.

And for a previous thief poster: Stop using the gear difference in wvw as a crutch for why thieves are imbalanced.

The main issues are entering and leaving fights -repeatedly- on a thieve’s terms. Have you seen a warrior rush a group of 3-4 people? How about A necro?A ranger? No..Know why? Because they don’t have a broken mechanic that lets them get away like a thief. Worst broken stealth mechanics in any game so far.

If your a glass cannon you should be punished if you miss your chance..not rewarded by allowing you to repeat the attempt repeatedly unhampered.
You should have only one chance to initiate the fight stealthed -and be thankful for that since no other class in the game can do that- and nothing else after it. If you don’t know how to use that already unfair advantage to win, then guess what..you were relying on broken mechanics to win.
Be like the rest of us..you don’t see necros and rangers leaving the fight when it goes bad unscathed then coming after you without you being able to stop their opener unopposed.

Rezzing while stealthed: I can’t even see the person I want to stomp. So if my AOE CC -assuming I have one- is down or I don’t have one like the majority of the classes I wait for the thief to rez him? What kinda crap is that where the downed target disappears?

The issues are so many and they don’t have anything to do with the so called imbalance in stats in wvw that only thief players see someone mentioning then repeat it without thinking. Most of the fighting happens away from forts so no bonus. There is no orb bonus. Consumable buffs..I’m sure that’s whats causing the over the top damage..nah. We all have exotic gear..not hard to get.. and a lot of us are 80..any lowbie with a shred of sense knows he/she has to eat it till they gear up and hit 80 so the complaints aren’t from them.

If the thief class was ok..then why do we see this thread 23 pages long and growing filled with complaints and no similar ones in any other class forums? Sheekitten’s a petition now..

Wilow.3061:

XII.9401:

Even when culling is fixed you will still have pistol condition build thieves disappearing every 5-7 seconds. Culling is not the only issue..restealthing repeatedly on such short interval is the 2nd part of the problem.

An in-depth look into the class is needed. Thieves should only have a stealth on approach. By granting them stealth during the fight it just turns them into the rogue class in every other mmorpg that Anet was trying to avoid. Not only that, but the thief in this game stealthes much MUCH more than any other mmorpg game stealth class.

Stop using the WvW excuse..we all see the thief coming and a lot of us are full exotics..its not that hard to get. If what you say is true about wvw..why are the complaints directly mainly at thieves? Why not at engineers? Or necros? Its the thief class..not everyone else.

Go to the sPvP forums, there is a reason people are using WvW examples of thief “OPness”. No one thinks thiefs are OP in sPvP. People complain about thieves in WvW because they can probably take advantage of the zerg mentality better then any other class now that AoE is capped at 5 targets.

Granting the thief in combat stealth does not make them like every other “rogue” out there. Actually, it’s the exact opposite. Those other “rogues” out there all have passive stealth, stuns and and evasion outside stealth. Thieves have in combat stealth and…in combat stealth. How does in combat stealth make them like other “rogues”?

As to your photo, nice “in under 2 seconds”. The thief is either a moron for using CnD before the 3sec debuff, or those hits took longer then 2 seconds. Either way, you are still a bad warrior playing his glass cannon toon and complaining that he was unable to land his combo after he Bull Rushed in. Also, not sure why you see a Steal and a Infiltrator’s strike next to each other…nor do I understand why I see him using DD in this 2 second burst pic…I also noticed you won that encounter. Nerf warrior IMO…they should not be able to kill things.

Please stop posting, or at the very least, please stop posting pics as proof.

I’m sorry but your discussion is kinda..wrong. And no..my stats are not glass canon. And no..I didn’t win that encounter.

As for people who keep posting L2p and troll more etc.. I thank you..this will only bump the thread up and demonstrate the mentality of players abusing a broken class.

I will keep providing evidence in pics and videos. Everyone who isn’t a thief experiences it. I simply show proof. I encourage everyone to take snapshots of the damage and show it here otherwise the broken class will never get fixed.

As for people who say L2count..I suggest the non-theif players pop that video and count the seconds between stealths.

If you don’t state your opinion and complaints in this game you will keep getting trolled by thieves.

Why does every other class have to equip AOE and spam it hoping it lands when fighting a thief while we aren’t forced to do that with every other class? Its easy for a thief to avoid AOEs since they SEE them while we can’t see the thief coming.
So our defense is to play whack the invisible mole?

That sounds like broken mechanics. The majority have spoken. If people thought the thief class was ok..this thread wouldn’t be this long.

Check it out: 21715 damage on a 1681 toughness/2032 hp from a thief in 2 seconds.

3 armor pieces vitality and 3 pieces toughness all exotics with 300 toughness from the defense line. No..quickness wasn’t up..didn’t get a chance to =D

Are we supposed to go all toughness /vitality to survive a 2 second burst? Not really..toughness won’t protect you from over the top damage -unless you can buff protection in time-.

I wouldn’t mind this damage if I could see someone coming instead of them blinking instantly towards me and being able to get away whenever they wanted.

Sheesh..I can’t imagine what the other classes have to do with their lower base toughness and vitality.

Pic attached.

kenshinakh.3672:

Use mistform or dodge. It works wonders against pesky backstabby thieves. I do it plenty of times. Once they miss their initial burst, they’re quite vulnerable.

Can’t time the dodge appropriately when you can’t see the thief approaching or when he will break out of stealth. You will avoid the 1st backstab but what about the 2nd attempt when they restealth? or the 3rd? or the 4th? What if they don’t blow quickness and wait for you to blow your mist form?

Over the top dps barely affected by the recent balances.

kenshinakh.3672:

Thieves aren’t OP. They’re quite on par with other classes if you test them in SPVP where most players know what they’re doing and how to fight. Also, culling isn’t a huge issue there compared to WvW.

I feel like I’m saying this over and over, but thieves don’t need anymore nerfs, at least not until the culling issue is fixed and time is given for players to learn how to fight thieves. I know this because I COULD theoretically beat my thief with my Ele and warrior through just theorycrafting. That doesn’t equate to real world situations, but whenever I see thieves, I’m not afraid of them, and to me who knows the in’s and out’s of my classes, certain nerfs mentioned in this thread would make thieves at a very big disadvantage.

And all the people who claim to be good in WVW… It’s WVW. You have your casual players in there and undergeared players. Even if you’re geared, there’s so many factors that changes how things play out. I’ve taken on so many groups that just aren’t thinking when they play. Some might say “Oh, you’re a thief so duh”, but it’s because the average player is REALLY slow. You run behind them and they take time to turn. You make them chase you in a circle around a house, and they’ll chase you while someone else is just slashing them in the back. You can even just run behind them or on the side of them and they won’t notice you’re there becuase most people look forward and don’t swivel their cameras around…

Stop the nerf bandwagon. Fix the culling bugs, and then wait a bit for things to balance out and for people to learn the game.

Even when culling is fixed you will still have pistol condition build thieves disappearing every 5-7 seconds. Culling is not the only issue..restealthing repeatedly on such short interval is the 2nd part of the problem.

An in-depth look into the class is needed. Thieves should only have a stealth on approach. By granting them stealth during the fight it just turns them into the rogue class in every other mmorpg that Anet was trying to avoid. Not only that, but the thief in this game stealthes much MUCH more than any other mmorpg game stealth class.

Stop using the WvW excuse..we all see the thief coming and a lot of us are full exotics..its not that hard to get. If what you say is true about wvw..why are the complaints directly mainly at thieves? Why not at engineers? Or necros? Its the thief class..not everyone else.

Otaur.9268:

Aervius.2016:

Otaur.9268:

You obviously do not understand. It says, armor/toughness does nothing to( lessen the severity of) the damage. Please at the very least learn to read before posting.

" Armor / Toughness does nothing to mitigate the damage and I know this for a fact. " -literally copy/pasted from your comment.

You obviously can’t very plainly see what was written. If you meant something else, you should have typed it. You can’t insult someone for “not reading my intended message” because they read the message you actually posted.

You actually believe armor and toughness help u versus a steal-cnd-bs combo? Please go make an ele, do not use protection, and test it yourself. I know protection works because without it I got hit for over 10k damage by backstab. Then with protection on by same thief backstab did 8001 damage, a damage reduction of 33% (protection). Now if armor/toughness scaled better, wouldn’t that damage change depending on armor? I have run 1800 armor to 3000 armor. The backstab combo does roughly the same damage. Therefore armor and toughness is not scaling well or at all versus high burst, making it pointless. At least on elementalist. Why do you think ele’s basically ignore earth for arcane and water.

Tested and true. I don’t have that problem with my ele since I switch to earth attunement prior to or while being hit. On my Engy-full toughness exotics- I get hit by that amount. Toughness won’t help you against backstab.

Drednyte.7601:

This isnt an exploit btw. It’s extremely easy to counter, all you have to do is walk through that north inner gate and you can see their “red” name tags though the wall. The issue isnt a mesmer exploiting, its folks not doing a proper mesmer sweep before they run off to do something else. As stated in previous posts, mesmer portals are extremely easy to block, just do a mesmer sweep!

I think it was. He was walking in and out of the wall.

I’m not sure if its allowed to post videos of this -or if this exploit has been reported- but I frapped it, anyway.

Mesmer hiding in a wall at the Northwest hill face near the North inner gate. Some of the AOE does not reach him/her if they back up into the ‘hole in the wall’. They simply hide in there and pop out to portal in later.

Once the moderator gives his Ok, I’ll post a link.

Wasabee.5031:

Thief without stealth? May as well change the name of the profession before remove the stealth out of the game.

Nah just give them stealth on approach and only one restealth like any reasonable stealth class. Pistol thief:5-7 seconds -shorter if you consider culling- visibility inbetween stealths =/ . Having the ability to initiate an attack twice almost uncontested with high damage should be enough. Asking for more is just silly.

Aratoa.7398:

Why do you keep saying we in your post? You’re not representing anyone but yourself. It’s pretty amusing though, how you’re attempting to say that people will leave if thieves aren’t nerfed into oblivion when thieves being nerfed as badly as you want would almost assuredly send many, if not more people away because the class they enjoy is now useless.

It might be amusing to you that you can play a broken class and enjoy the game on the expense of other people. I’m sad you see things that way. We are asking for balancing not nerfing to the ground. Unlike certain players, I think the majority of GW2 players enjoy a fair challenge in the game.

Its been proven time and again that people who play fotm or OP classes simply move on to the next one. If you leave the game because your class was balanced after it was overpowered and broken by the opinion of the majority, maybe this game isn’t your cup of tea =).

Though amusing to the players of the thief class, losing non-thief players is not amusing to Anet.

Leogolas.6941:

Yea, high toughness and vitality warrior build plus “fear me” “endure pain” could easily make the glass cannon thief run away or die in the end. But I choose the path of GC build and thus for change of high burst , I tend to be killed by GC thief maybe 6/10 of the time in a 1vs1 situation.
Seriously though, culling issue must be resloved 1st b4 we talk about buff/nerf thieves.

All the other classes should NOT be pigeonholed into certain builds to combat a single broken class. The game does not revolve around one class. Its guild wars not thief wars.

Archonis.7249:

ryodanspider.4180:

Wow, is amazing how open people are to discussion. Those that play thief are really hurt that people find the class completely over the top. Look in my opinion, theift is ridiculous, I have 3600 armor and still can be take from 17k hp to about 5k in two to three seconds. Best part is as soon as i put up a bit of a fight, he stealth and repeat the process or runs away. Stop acting like this class is alright, is not. At this point all we can do is wait till the 14th if some serious balance hasn’t been put in place then this game is clearly not for me. Nonetheless, I wish much success to this company and I do think the game is fun, just not pvp anymore. My two cents.

Thieves are open to discussion, but not when someone like XII is trying to run a crusade to nerf the thief simply because he won’t L2P Warrior.

On my Warrior I have ZERO issues with killing thieves. I see a DD thief stealth. I move away. I see a PD thief stealth, I get my CC ready to burst him. I see a SP thief. I pop my stability and quickness and WTFPWN him before he even gets his PW off.

All these bad Warriors and Ele’s QQ because they have ZERO situational awareness and even less knowledge about their profession. Instead of learning how to deal with certain builds, they instead come to their forums and cry for nerfs.

I think PvP is great. There really isn’t a whole lot wrong with it, except for people that can’t take losing on and off.

Because a team has a thief, doesn’t mean that they auto-win.

1.You move away from a D/D dagger? How many non thief players here think that moving away is that easy or that running away from a thief is the solution in this game?

2.Of course, you accuse anyone who points out the broken mechanics in detail as someone on a crusade..gee..sounds like someone plays a thief =D . Everyone needs to L2P except for the thief players -and you, of course when your not playing a thief-.

Try posting an intelligent reply so I can break it for you =). Anyone whoever played a mmorpg knows very well that fotm classes troll the forum regularly to post L2P replies in hoping of dissuading developers from imbalances. I’m afraid that the Anet devs are smarter than you think.

I just enjoy watching fotm players squirm before the impending balance patch. No worries..I’m sure your already working on your mesmer alt =).

Assuming you go down the healing trait lines with appropriate gear and runes:

Healing (not a big fan of regen as opposed to burst heals):
Warrior: around 2k group healing per shout for allies and I think the range is 1200? Also, if you have the right runes you can remove a condition per shout.

The shortest cooldown possible with certain shouts is 20seconds. So you can use 3 shouts giving you 6k healing and 3 condition removal every 20 seconds.

Guardian: you mainly bring in some heals which are ok except for the tome of courage which is a game changer. Keep in mind that attentive players will cc you out of it but popping a long stability prior might help.

Reviving:
Support hammer warriors are good at revival for the following reasons:
1.You revive 10% faster and if you have certain runes you will revive 20% faster- I think it stacks? never tried it-.
2.Most importantly, you have 4 interrupters:Burst hammer, 4& 5 hammer and the fear shout(instant): these are good when you are trying to knock someone off your ally to revive. Even a thief -most don’t use stability- can be easily knocked off as when you see a thief downing your ally they will most likely stealth to stomp -hope they change this ridiculous mechanic- or if you see your ally down with no surrounding stomper that means there might be a thief trying to stomp. So you run over there, slap your cc and revive.
When someone is trying to stealth rez their ally or the supervisor, you can unload your AOE ccs to knock the rezzer off the target and keep smacking your AOEs down.
3.You can use your shouts while reviving to heal yourself in case someone is focusing you while you are reviving an ally -which is usually the case when you knock someone off their knee jerk reaction is to focus you-.
4.Battle standard can help revive allies. I never tested this. I dunno if it works well or bugged etc.
Guardians:They can rez 10% faster if you have the appropriate rune. They can also spec into an area knock back when they start rezzing. You can also pop your traits which will give you protection when rezzing which is better than what a warrior can do to soak up the damage while rezzing.

CC, Boons and conditions:
Warrior: You have to bring something else to the table. Given the lack of perc/crit dmg on your gear, it might not be helpful to go spike damage as your 2nd role as other party members should fill that role if they spec for it.
I suggest CC with a hammer to compliment the healing. If you go down the healing trait line and the toughness one -has hammer cooldown reduction- you will be sitting on high survivability and you can also throw in the fear shout as extra cc -but it has a longer cooldown-.
Use superior sharpening stones to gain an edge by converting the high toughness you will have into extra power.
Equipping a sword/warhorn as your second weapon set gives your allies a break from any kinda snare with warhorn 4 in order to run away when a zerg joins the fun and you can use sword 2 to keep a big distance between you and your chasers -abandoning your allies, ofcourse- GS for mobility is nice but it does not benefit your group’s mobility and shifts your focus from cc which is on fairly low cooldown if you spec into it, I think.

Guardians:I really find the great sword 5 as a great ability to stack people for your burst dps and your hammer warrior to slam them down in a nice clump. I only know of the ele magnetic shield that can do that.
group stability, retaliation and Aegis. If specced into it, Aegis grants retaliation to allies and healing -minor- on removal, I think. Also, with the runes of the monk you can get an Aegis upon elite skill usage. I’m not sure if this particular one can grant retaliation and healing on removal as well.
Speccing into it and using soldier runes can give your allies one boon and 2 condition removals with each shout -on top of the shouts buffs-.
I guess your 2nd weapon set can be a hammer -much inferior cc to the warrior but every lil bit helps- or mace/shield for extra protection but I’m sure other guardians can inform you better than me.

To sum it up:
-Support warrior gives the best group cc in the game and ok heals/condition removal as well as good revivals. Slotting all shouts though would hamper your mobility if you get CCed but you can always trait into 10% move speed and use your shots to remove ccs as well as using your hammer burst to close gaps. I never tried banners as I find that you have to be mobile in a 5man to hit and run and avoid zergs and they don’t offer burst heals. They might be good in 5mans I dunno.
-Support guardian, good heals, good condition removal, group stability, retaliation and Aegis and the above.

I find a hammer warrior much more fun -the shouts are boring though- and a support guardian is fun once you pop a greatsword -if you have it on-. scepter/shield can be fun for that extra cc>.>.