Guild Wars 2

I agree that blind is ok as support to prevent some damage.
But the main problem is that the thief has nothing special that would be of any use.

blast finisher for might? → warriors easy might
Smoke screen? → guardian wall has longer duration + reflect. but still somewhat useful for stealth

I think the main reason a party should take a thief… is to skip trash mobs. And that is bad.

But there are other classes that have quite the same problem.
At the moment only guardian, mesmer and warrior have something great enough to choose them for a party.

stealth is mainly for skipping trash. and new content like the new twilight arbor path dont have such. because anet does not like trash skipping as far as i know.

PopeUrban.2578:

Devourer Venom:
Add 5s cripple and 2 stacks of 5s bleed.

Ice Drake Venom:
Chill foes with the next three attacks. (1 second) and add freeze counters on each hit. These counters persist for ten seconds and can not be removed. If a target acquires three freeze counters, that target is frozen in a block of ice, stunning it for three seconds.

Skale Venom:
Apply Skale Venom to your attacks. (10 seconds vulnerability, 10 seconds torment)

Spider Venom:
Add a 1s immobilze in addition to poison. (Canyon spiders!)

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Elite Skill:
———————————————
Basilisk Venom:
Your next attack turns your foe to stone. (1.5 seconds stun, 1 second activation time) Make this instacast, OR return it’s old functionality (the only unbreakable stun in the game)

———————————————
Traits:
———————————————
Merge quick/residual venoms in to slot XII

Replace VII with:
Potent venoms – Gain 50 (100?) conditon damage for 15 seconds each time you use a venom.

I like your ideas so far. But your Ice Drake Venom would be overpowered with venom share. You would have to add a damage reduction for the enemy while frozen

The potent venoms trait would be amazing if it works with venom share so the damaging venoms are more effecient on not condition speced allies.

Stooperdale.3560:

Venoms have a classic design problem. They are balanced so that thieves with all the venom traits are not overpowered, however this means that venom skills themselves are poor. Instead the venom skills should be worth a slot without any traits and then given a reasonable boost by better designed traits.

This essentially means that the existing venom traits are too strong. Clearly though the venom skills have to be improved before making the venom traits weaker.

I agree with you.
Using Venoms without the traits is to weak.
Using Venom traits with only 1 venom is to weak

Traits like Venomous Aura combined with the Basilisk Venom is also a big problem.
Think about what would happen if you allow other classes to share their elite.

I think changing Basilisk Venom to have no activation time like the other venoms would be amazing. It would give you the unique ability in PvE to interrupt bosses even with defiant stacks up. And in PvP the warrior would still be better at stunning.

It just forces you to prepare your stun breaker = more skillful play
while gaining more mobility because of the shorter cooldown.

evilapprentice.6379:

I like Shared weakness – it feels unique and useful, without being OP.

yes, it’s similar to my idea but without evade for the incoming attack and lower internal cooldown.

If you engange the fight with shadowstep, you will still have a stunbreaker for the next 20 seconds with shadow return.

PopeUrban.2578:

———————————————
Skills:
———————————————
Devourer Venom:
add cripple and bleed

Ice Drake Venom:
Add debuff on each hit. 3 stacks of debuff freezes enemy

Skale Venom:
Increase torment duration

Spider Venom:
Add a 1s immobilze in addition to poison. (Canyon spiders!)

———————————————
Elite Skill:
———————————————
Basilisk Venom:
Remove activation time or make the stun unbreakable

———————————————
Traits:
———————————————
Merge quick/residual venoms in to slot XII

Replace VII with:
Potent venoms – Gain 50 (100?) conditon damage for 15 seconds each time you use a venom.

Black Teagan.9215:

General
Reduce CD’s of Venoms to 35 Secs, except BV.
Poison duration of Spider Venom: 5 secs per hit. 5 Attacks.
+
Improved Venoms (Potent Poison merged into Quick Venoms)
Venom skills recharge 20% faster and (poison) have a higher duration of 25%.

Basilisk Venom
CD 50-60 Sec
Your next attack turns your foe to stone and remove all buffs for 1,5 secs.

This is a sub topic for the state of the thief. you can get to the main overview by clicking one of the links below.
This Topic is used to discuss about a specific skill or trait and to make suggestions on how to improve it.

• General
• Traits – weak
• Traits – strong
• Skills – weak
• Skills – strong
• Wild Ideas

—————————————————————————————————————-
Venoms:
—————————————————————————————————————-
I will make this sub topic special because it’s not about a single trait or skill but about a skilltype with designated traits. So changes would affect not only the single trait or skill but everything that is linked to it. Keep in mind that venom share can make some stuff extremely powerful.

All venoms have the same cooldown and duration.

Cooldown: 45 seconds
Duration: 30 seconds
.
———————————————
Skills:
———————————————
Devourer Venom:
Your next two attacks Immobilize. (2 seconds)

Ice Drake Venom:
Chill foes with the next three attacks. (1 second)

Skale Venom:
Apply Skale Venom to your attacks. (10 seconds vulnerability, 5 seconds torment)

Spider Venom:
Poison foes with your next five attacks. (6 seconds)
.
———————————————
Elite Skill:
———————————————
Basilisk Venom:
Your next attack turns your foe to stone. (1.5 seconds stun, 1 second activation time)

———————————————
Traits: Deadly Arts
———————————————
IV Venomous Strength
When applied, venoms grant 2 stacks of might for 20 seconds.

VIII Quick Venoms
Venom skills recharge 20% faster.

XII Residual Venom
Applied venoms last one extra strike.
.
———————————————
Traits: Shadow Arts
———————————————
IX Leeching Venoms
Steal health when triggering a venom. This can only occur once per strike.

XII Venomous Aura
When you use a venom skill, you apply the effects to all nearby allies as well.
.
———————————————
Ideas :
———————————————

Gwalchgwn.1659:

^I personally would like his option more. Except for the loss on stunbreak on use. It’s a great skill for escaping when you get surprised. This kind of forces us to take another stunbreaker just to compensate (for example if a basilisk BS thief attacks you). In my current build this would I have to run with 3 stunbreakers (since two of them will only work after placing them, with one having a potentive use of 20 seconds)

So in regard of the stunbreaking part, i’d prefer having 3condi clear on 50 sec then 2 condi clear on 30 sec

The point of my idea is to use it to engange into a fight and use the shadow return to disengage. Removing the stun break on the first shadowstep prevents you from using it when getting caught off guard.

In return for the remove of stun breaker you can use it more often and have more mobility.

TeamBattleAxe.3901:

Disagree completely. Thief needs MORE condition cleanse options that don’t depend on stealth, not less… especially with the current meta’s incredible emphasis on condi-spam builds.

is removing 2 conditions in 30 seconds worse then 3 conditions in 50 seconds?

My idea:

Shadowstep to target area. Becomes Shadow Return, which returns you to your starting area and cures three two conditions. (50s 30s cooldown)

Stun Breaker

Increase the duration for Shadow Return from 10s to 20s.
(The Stun Breaker on Shadow Return will stay)

This is a sub topic for the state of the thief. you can get to the main overview by clicking one of the links below.
This Topic is used to discuss about a specific skill or trait and to make suggestions on how to improve it.

• General
• Traits – weak
• Traits – strong
• Skills – weak
• Skills – strong
• Wild Ideas

———————————————
Shadowstep:
———————————————
Utility Skill: Deception
Shadowstep to target area. Becomes Shadow Return, which returns you to your starting area and cures three conditions. (50s cooldown)

Stun Breaker

———————————————
Ideas :
———————————————

crouze.3078:

Shadowstep to target area. Becomes Shadow Return, which returns you to your starting area and cures three two conditions. (50s 30s cooldown)

Stun Breaker

Increase the duration for Shadow Return from 10s to 20s.
(The Stun Breaker on Shadow Return will stay)

Mug is an adept trait as well

So it should be powerfull enough to make you think about which one you pick

I disagree that the thief is a “really good 1v1 dueler”.
The main advantage in a 1v1 is that he can reset the fight really easy.

But other then that the thief does not have a real advantage fighting other 1v1 specced professions

I think Backstab needs a change. I know you wont like to hear it but it’s to much damage in a short period of time.

And one of the main reasons for my suggestions regarding Backstab and Heartseeker is to make it more interesting to use them. And i think building something up to increase the heartseeker damage is more interesting then just starting to spam it when the target is low.

Olba.5376:

crouze.3078:

Olba.5376:

I don’t think that’s a good idea.

I mean, who would use it for 5 stacks anyway? That’s kitten weak compared to the benefits you can get from staying in stealth with points in Shadow Arts.

+5% damage for everyone who attacks the taget isn’t that bad. And when changing heartseeker to work with vulnerability stacks, it would give you a benefit for using more then only 1 of your skills.

The damage would not be done instant like with the current backstab.
You would have to build up for your good damage making it more interesting to play and others wouldn’t complain about getting to much damage with a single hit.

5 Stacks of vulnerability would be useless for PvP. And with Backstab useless, no one would play D/D and D/P would be reduced into a troll/chase spec. Enjoy your masses of evade-spamming S/D thieves.

If you are talking about 1vs1 i totally agree.
It is weaker then the current backstab.

But in a teamfight those vulnerability stacks can help alot when you focus a target.

I knew that backstab and heartseeker would be the most difficult topics to discuss.

evilapprentice.6379:

crouze.3078:

Daendur.2357:

crouze.3078:

The damage would not be done instant like with the current backstab.

That’s exactly the point of BS.

Thats not fun and anet knows that.

Using it to surprise someone to put him into a vulnerable spot is way more fun i think.
Not only for the thief that has to use more of his skills to be effective, but also for the enemy that get at least a chance to react.

Whether or not its fun is a matter of opinion.

Whether you find it fun or not, a PvP game needs burst classes, or everyone will roll sustain/attrition builds.

I dont say anything against burst.
But bursting someone down in 3 seconds or in 10 seconds makes a big difference in gameplay.

And you can allways burst no matter what if you coordinate your group and focus a target with your strongest skills.

Daendur.2357:

crouze.3078:

The damage would not be done instant like with the current backstab.

That’s exactly the point of BS.

Thats not fun and anet knows that.

Using it to surprise someone to put him into a vulnerable spot is way more fun i think.
Not only for the thief that has to use more of his skills to be effective, but also for the enemy that get at least a chance to react.

Olba.5376:

crouze.3078:

My Idea:

Leap and strike your foe. The less health more vulnerability stacks your target has, the more damage you cause.

less then 10 stacks:
more then 10 stacks:
more then 20 stacks:

But Vulnerability already does that?

Not to mention that outside of Body Shot, Thief has crappy access to Vulnerability. And it would make Thieves spam Heartseeker in dungeons because of having 20+ stacks on bosses constantly.

Dagger is already a kitten boring weapon in PvE, there’s really no need to make it any more boring.

I agree that it would be strong on bosses. But it is not assured that there will be 20+ stacks on the boss.

You would help to stack the vulnerability with the backstab and other skills to get the most out of heartseeker.

Skale Venom would help as well.

In PvP you could use traps and get some extra vulnerability stacks with Corrosive Traps and attack them while they are vulnerable.

Olba.5376:

I don’t think that’s a good idea.

I mean, who would use it for 5 stacks anyway? That’s kitten weak compared to the benefits you can get from staying in stealth with points in Shadow Arts.

+5% damage for everyone who attacks the taget isn’t that bad. And when changing heartseeker to work with vulnerability stacks, it would give you a benefit for using more then only 1 of your skills.

The damage would not be done instant like with the current backstab.
You would have to build up for your good damage making it more interesting to play and others wouldn’t complain about getting to much damage with a single hit.

No, i think it should trigger one of the 3 utility skills regardless of being on cooldown or not.
Otherwise you rly would abuse it by only putting 1 skill on cooldown and then steal.

It is way more organized with creating multiple topics.
Otherwise its really hard to keep track of everything.
Talking about 20 different things in 1 topic at the same time is really chaotic.

And i see my idea more as a change then a nerf.
Running around alone would make it a bit weaker depending on the amount of vulnerability you can stack.

But on the other hand it would make it stronger in group play.

My Idea:

Leap and strike your foe. The less health more vulnerability stacks your target has, the more damage you cause.

less then 10 stacks:
more then 10 stacks:
more then 20 stacks:

This is a sub topic for the state of the thief. you can get to the main overview by clicking one of the links below.
This Topic is used to discuss about a specific skill or trait and to make suggestions on how to improve it.

• General
• Traits – weak
• Traits – strong
• Skills – weak
• Skills – strong
• Wild Ideas

———————————————
Heartseeker:
———————————————
Dagger Skill: 2
Leap and strike your foe. The less health your target has, the more damage you cause.

———————————————
Ideas :
———————————————

crouze.3078:

Leap and strike your foe. The less health more vulnerability stacks your target has, the more damage you cause.

less then 10 stacks:
more then 10 stacks:
more then 20 stacks:

My idea:

Attack your foe from the shadows, applying vulnerability if you hit from behind. (5 stacks for 10 seconds)

In addition to that i thought about changing heartseeker to trigger on the amount of vulnerability stacks.

This is a sub topic for the state of the thief. you can get to the main overview by clicking one of the links below.
This Topic is used to discuss about a specific skill or trait and to make suggestions on how to improve it.

• General
• Traits – weak
• Traits – strong
• Skills – weak
• Skills – strong
• Wild Ideas

———————————————
Backstab:
———————————————
Dagger Skill: stealth
Attack your foe from the shadows, striking for double damage if you hit from behind.

———————————————
Ideas :
———————————————

crouze.3078:

Attack your foe from the shadows, applying vulnerability if you hit from behind. (5 stacks for 10 seconds)

That would make the dagger auto attack to strong.
But on the other hand it would buff the spider venom as well and thats a good thing.

When decreasing damage of the dagger chain 3 skill it would be great.

I dont know if it really needs to become a grandmaster trait.
The shadow arts trait can clean the same amount of conditions in the same time and is a adept trait as well.
But making it a master trait would be ok i think.

My idea:

Shadowstep away and give swiftness (12s) Evade and knock down the enemy when you are disabled (stun, daze, float, knock down, launch, knock back, sink, or fear). This effect cannot occur more than once every 90 seconds.

This is a sub topic for the state of the thief. you can get to the main overview by clicking one of the links below.
This Topic is used to discuss about a specific skill or trait and to make suggestions on how to improve it.

• General
• Traits – weak
• Traits – strong
• Skills – weak
• Skills – strong
• Wild Ideas

———————————————
Hard to Catch:
———————————————
Acrobatics Trait: XI
Shadowstep away and give swiftness (12s) when you are disabled (stun, daze, float, knock down, launch, knock back, sink, or fear). This effect cannot occur more than once every 30 seconds.

———————————————
Ideas :
———————————————

crouze.3078:

Shadowstep away and give swiftness (12s) Evade and knock down the enemy when you are disabled (stun, daze, float, knock down, launch, knock back, sink, or fear). This effect cannot occur more than once every 90 seconds.

knyy.6427:

1. Evade all attacks for 3s when you are disabled (stun, daze, float, knock down, launch, knock back, sink, or fear). This effect cannot occur more than once every 120 seconds.

2. Blind all enemies near you and give swiftness (10s) when you are disabled (stun, daze, float, knock down, launch, knock back, sink, or fear). This effect cannot occur more than once every 30 seconds.

Magische Boek.2530:

shared weakness:

When you are disabled (stun, daze, float, knock down, launch, knock back, sink, or fear)
you apply the same disable to the causing enemy. 45 secconds cooldown.

the you go for your +5% dagger damage.

It would be similar to the combo fields and finisher.
You might have a good blast finisher. But you get the most damage out of it when you have someone in your party with enough fire fields

I think it is really strange that it doesn’t remove chilled at the moment.

But for cripple and chilled i use withdraw anyways.

The damage bonus while wielding a bundle would make a great ele/thief combo.
But yes, other then that there is no real value for this.

It is more like “oh, i have an elementalist in my group. for this dungeon i can change my +5% dagger damage into +20% damage with those elemental weapons”

My Idea:

Dodging removes cripple and weakness 1 condition from you. (10s cooldown)

With vigor buff and Feline Grace you can do 1 dodge every 3.5 seconds at most.
The Shadow Arts condition remove trait can clean a condition every 3 seconds. (this should be changed then)

This is a sub topic for the state of the thief. you can get to the main overview by clicking one of the links below.
This topic is used to discuss about a specific skill or trait and to make suggestions on how to improve it.

• General
• Traits – weak
• Traits – strong
• Skills – weak
• Skills – strong
• Wild Ideas

———————————————
Fleet of Foot:
———————————————
Acrobatics Trait: VI
Dodging removes cripple and weakness from you. (10s cooldown)

———————————————
Ideas:
———————————————

crouze.3078:

Dodging removes cripple and weakness 1 condition from you. (10s cooldown)

DanH.5879:

Dodging removes cripple, chilled and weakness from you. (7s cooldown)

Kolly.9872:

Acrobatics Trait XI (switch position with “Hard to Catch”):

Dodging removes cripple, chilled and immobilize from you. (3s cooldown)
Dodging removes 1 condition from you. (no internal cooldown)

My idea:

33% chance to inflict poison for 5 seconds on critical hits. This effect can only trigger once every 10 seconds.

This is a sub topic for the state of the thief. you can get to the main overview by clicking one of the links below.
This Topic is used to discuss about a specific skill or trait and to make suggestions on how to improve it.

• General
• Traits – weak
• Traits – strong
• Skills – weak
• Skills – strong
• Wild Ideas

———————————————
Potent Poison:
———————————————
Deadly Arts Trait: V
Increases poison duration by 33%.

———————————————
Ideas :
———————————————

crouze.3078:

33% chance to inflict poison for 5 seconds on critical hits. This effect can only trigger once every 10 seconds.

DanH.5879:

[The Burning Poison]:
When you poison an enemy, you also add burning for 1 second.

NinjaEd.3946:

Potent Venom:
Increase damage output while a venom is active (15%?)

ensoriki.5789:

a) Increase critical hit chance by 10% against poisoned foes.
b) poisoned foes within 600 range of you heal 15% less. Poison duration is 20% longer.

Stooperdale.3560:

Increase the duration of poison, torment and weakness by 33%

Daendur.2357:

Potent Poison:
Poison is harder to remove (condition remover just half it’s duration)

My Idea to balance:

Stealing recharges all skills of one type (venoms, signets, traps, tricks, or deceptions) one of your utility skills. Deal 10% 20% more damage while wielding a bundle.

Hi, this is the first sub topic for the state of the thief. I would like to see you talking about the good and bad things about specific traits or skills and make your suggestions on how to improve those.

• General
• Traits – weak
• Traits – strong
• Skills – weak
• Skills – strong
• Wild Ideas

———————————————
Improvisation:
———————————————
Deadly Arts Trait: VII
Stealing recharges all skills of one type (venoms, signets, traps, tricks, or deceptions). Deal 10% more damage while wielding a bundle.

———————————————
Ideas:
———————————————

crouze.3078:

Stealing recharges all skills of one type (venoms, signets, traps, tricks, or deceptions) one of your utility skills. Deal 10% 20% more damage while wielding a bundle.

evilapprentice.6379:

Stolen items are 20% more effective, deal 10% more damage when holding a stolen item", but the first part of that is tough to implement.

Seras.5702:

Stealing reduce the cooldown on all utilities that are currently on cooldown by 10%. Increases the duration of your stolen skills by 20%.

Siva Mira.3546:

Stealing reduces the remaining cooldown on all utility skills by 33%. Deal 10% more damage while wielding a bundle.

While reducing the initiative gain from infusion of shadow, the gain from patience would increase.

And as long as the stealth for smoke+leap would be reduced, its wouldnt make perma invis easy.

I might open up some other topics to discuss specific things.
Then we dont discuss about 10 different ideas for 20 skills or traits in one topic

“bursting” a class that might have 25k life and 3 life bars sounds funny
Not to mention the nearly 20 sec permablind for melee in plague form.

I think its extremely hard to fight a necro with thief.
You have to play rly smart and switch from melee to range and let the necro burn his cooldowns. Then you might have a chance to fight on equal ground.

Gaining a acrobatics trait with similar condition remove would help alot.
Fleet of foot was mentioned. instead of only removing cripple and weakness, it could clean other conditions as well.

Only question ist how much should be cleaned and what should the internal cooldown be?

I also have a crazy idea for daggers.

Backstab: instead of double damage from behind applies 5 vulnerability for 10 seconds.
Heartseeker: instead of different damage based on the enemies HP make it based on the vulnerability stacks on the enemy (0-9, 10-19, 20-25)

keep in mind that we are talking about an adept trait.
And it starts removing 1 condition upon entering stealth.
So a delay for the second condition remove by 1 second shouldnt hurt that much.
It would still be strong.

Those two are some of the strongest traits the thief has.
And in order to increase the value of some Traits, others need to suffer or the combination would be overpowered.

http://argos-soft.net/GW2ArmorGallery/index.php?sex=1&race=2&color=10&weight=2

very few armor skins are missing.

But you can get the anonymity hood from another character.
Thats what i did as well- But its a long time ago

With the trait feline grace a dodge will cost 35% endurance and you gain 5% / sec
So you can do 1 dodge every 7 seconds (4 seconds with vigor)

with sigils of endurance you would get 1 extra cond remove every 10 seconds
Rune of adventurer would be 1 extra cond remove every 15 sec as well.

would have to compare it to condition removal from other classes

Thx, then please feel free to edit your post and explain what you think is not good and what could be changed.

a “deleted. i still stand by what i said” is very confusing out of context

with the stun breaker remove, reduction to 2 cond remove for shadow return and cooldown reduction to 30s you would have less stun breaker, slighty more condition remove and more mobility.

I would call that balanced.
Not reducing the cooldown would make it way weaker.

And your calculation is not usefull. You dont wait until the last second before using shadow return. You might use shadow return 1 seconds after you used shadowstep. then the “effective cooldown” as you call it, would be 49 seconds.

DANGRYdan.8392:

crouze.3078:

XI Hard to Catch
Shadowstep away and give swiftness (12s) when you are disabled (stun, daze, float, knock down, launch, knock back, sink, or fear). This effect cannot occur more than once every 30 seconds.
Idea: Shadowstep away Break stuns and give swiftness stability(5s) when you are disabled (stun, daze, float, knock down, launch, knock back, sink, or fear). This effect cannot occur more than once every 30 seconds.

The shadow step away is much better than changing it to a stun break. This trait is one of the most effective ways to survive FOTM warrior knock down + hundred blades. But the change from swiftness to stability would be amazing!

I agree with other posters that it should NOT be a grandmaster skill though.

I added another idea in the “discussion section”: evading the next stun and knock down the enemy instead with 90s cd. we could even make it stronger and give a short stability duration.