Guild Wars 2

Gibimo.2193:

lol players you opposing looks like kitten with the other hand while one hand pressing keyboard.

Was more a “concept” video than “best fights I’ve ever had” video. Yeah the players suck, but I don’t regularly record video and I was just trying to show my build.

I might record more in the future and showcase a “best fights” montage…but that’s only if I have the time/motivation.

Well, I consider that DPS “viable” even if it isn’t as large as some other classes. Class utility makes up for the smaller DPS on the conditions. And PvE content is easy enough that adding in some extra DPS only slightly effects the outcome. Of course, I wouldn’t mind more DPS on my current build…but it is WvW and not primarily PvE.

If you wanted more condi DPS the best option would be to swap out for Lotus Training in Daredevil and drop the SA line for DA, which will give you more poison DPS. Honestly, if all you care about are pure DPS numbers without any of the survivability or utility then condition damage isn’t for you (at least on thief).

In PvE the build can either stay the same or take the trait to reduce venom cooldowns. Now that venomshare is baseline you can do much more condition damage. Probably your burst approaches…between 10 and 14k every 32 seconds.

Condi builds are generally built to be more tanky. If you want to do more damage you could always swap out for Viper’s to hit more consistent “high” numbers—although I would not recommend it personally. The thing to keep in mind is that sometimes having “more damage” isn’t the best option. Say in Fractals, where you might be able to safely res your entire team because of your survivability. Worth more to your team than a few extra big numbers imo.

I don’t have access to a computer to run tests so you will just have to test it out damage wise in Heart of the Mists on that big golem.

Look in my signature for video w/ build. It is the same for PvE and WvW.

I’ve commanded HoT zones pre nerf.

I’ve beat champions solo.

Condition damage not viable in PvE? What?

Look at my signature. Condi thief is viable. And not just D/D death blossom.

P/D top three favorites:

Gunk for confusion, healing seed for regeneration/condi clear, and tuft for stealth on demand.

P/D bottom three (but not bad skills actually if you know how to use them): Warrior Axe, because you need to first create a poison field to use it offensively, Head Crack, because the skill is used most against a class with a lot of blocks, and Tooth because often long term bleed will be cleansed anyways before it does too much damage.

Overall though I like the stolen skills for the most part.

Gunk: you can throw it ground target which is essential because it does regular damage that will end your stealth even if you enter stealth after throwing it. The ground targeting is bugged, so it doesn’t always work, but if you throw it where you plan to be whirl and projectile finishers will proc confusion. Very powerful if you are already layering condis and then the target has confusion to deal with as well.

Healing Seed is perfect. It clears condis, can provide healing through blast and leap finishers, and regeneration of long duration by projectile and whirl finishers. Fighting against Ranger/Druid this skill is essential to keeping health up against a target that can apply constant ranged pressure while you are visible/targetable.

Tuft is great because thief can use stealth for offense and defense. There is a short cast time so it is less likely to be interrupted. Basically this is the skill that all thieves wish was our “F3” skill, an on demand stealth/blind with a low cool down.

Plasma is good because it grants protection and aegis. A block and reduced damage feel really nice when most thieves are used to weaker HP and weaker armor. Add in the rest of the boons and it is a solid performance increase. This doesn’t make my “top three” because the boons, while nice, are not combo fields or stealth which are crucial to winning “all effort in” fights.

Ice is a long duration chill. By itself not as useful, unless you have a lot of condition application. Either a power build or a condi build could take advantage of the chill’s movement speed reduction and skill recharge increase. Still, it is highly likely to be cleansed so this falls in the “better not rely on this to win the fight” category.

Essence Sap is strong, I like being able to slow down a class that normally has a good pace of fighting. The duration can be extended decently on the slow. Overall a powerful way to slow down a fierce assault and turn the tide of the battle. This didn’t make my top three because it is a single target ability. Most single target abilities, while individually powerful, are not as useful as combo fields or special mechanics.

Fear is decent. The addition of an AoE interrupt/fear is what makes this skill especially strong. Stealing from the necro can help win the team fight for you. He has HP so he will be around long enough in the fight to help make his teammates loose due to fear interrupts—which can be initiated from stealth without warning.

Whirling Axe is ok, but due to the short duration of the poison field on short bow (our only offensive field), timing this can be a pain. For power thieves the axe’s are much better but suffers due to the “stand next to the tanky guy with the thousand blades” aspect. The saving grace is projectile reflection. But this, of course, won’t help against most warriors who don’t tend to use either rifle or bow.

Headcrack is great, if you can find a gap to land one on the guardian. Especially if you interrupt a critical heal, guardians won’t survive long because of their naturally low HP pool. Again, it went into the bottom because this is either a great move, or wasted because a block completely negates the effect. Great against DH though, given the directional nature of their block special. Also good for stopping their winged leap heal.

Tooth and Egg are “meh” for me. Basically, use it because it will help you, but don’t expect a major improvement in the odds because you used it correctly.

There is a staff variation I’ve run that can facetank the lords.

Basically it involves taking every on hit, on crit, on initiative use heal ability. A bit of a one trick pony but it can basically heal up to full while cleaving. Staff was what I used but there is no reason a D/P version wouldn’t be moderately successful.

This is something I’ve been fooling around with on the build editor modified to fit the description above. http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQJAWFn8MBlOBGOBkmildCbLAUbOQzHwG4Fs7tEn+BA-TlCEABAcIAe4IA4v6P+q84JlYwv/Qb6CM4CAYoSQEeAABAQA25OTn7MwQH6QH6QHa7cnDdnDdnlCgiRWA-w

I think that playing around with the revealed effect might create some interesting new gameplay.

For example: what if the Shadow Arts trait line reduced the effectiveness of applied revealed effects by 33%. This means that instead of three seconds of revealed on the thief attacking they would only have two. Or an applied reveal from engi/ranger would also be shorter in duration.

I think also that, given how it has made thief combat feel clunky, I’m not sure keeping the cooldown on stealth attack is the way to go. Before I thought reducing it to 0.5 seconds would be ideal…but now I think a better solution is to make a failed attack unstealth the thief with a 0-1 second reveal instead of the usual amount. It could be paired with the suggestion above to help reduce that “failed reveal.”

I would make 15 initiative baseline and at the same time and I would also consider moving some additional condition clear into the Deadly Arts line—such as making Mug also clear a few conditions. I would then nerf the condition clearing ability of Escapist’s Absolution.

But again all of these changes are imagined together and individually might be a nerf or buff depending on the player.

[EDIT] My State of the Thief—Conditions and Traitline Relevance

Thief today is all about Daredevil. The reasons for this are particular to the other classes and the evolving meta that came out of HoT and the subsequent balancing patches. Thief is a low HP class and therefore requires high condition clear uptime in order to not die to stray condition inducing field effects and targeted abilities. Daredevil with Escapist’s Absolution both answered the call and obliterated any other option. Only a few other builds can match the condition clear that is offered in the Daredevil line—a condition clear which is painfully overpowered at times. Between dodging and using evade weapon skills and utilities thief can become basically immune to all but the most heavy condition applications (Mesmer). We need more condition clears in lines that don’t have any condition clears and a nerf to the condition clear in the Daredevil line to give us a fighting shot at other builds.

DrD is basically my condi clear line. I cleanse by dodging. I have lots of dodges. I am highly immune to cripple/immobilize. That alone justifies taking the line.

There is also synergy between Uncatchable in Trickery and the dodges that Daredevil provides. For some examples of how I play it there is the video in my signature if you’re interested.

I find CnD to be a better use of initiative. Mainly SB as second set is just better because it provides more utility overall. One combo that is possible is lay down a poison field, swap weapons and stealth, then combo with the field. Sneak Attack is a finisher so all the bullets will poison in addition to any stacked venom. The teleport is also a mainstay, as is cluster bomb for some NPC fights, like killing camps efficiently. Naturally, Death Blossom could probably clear those NPCs slightly faster, but I would lose the rest of the utility from the SB.

Damage wise, the bleed from Sneak Attack is far more damage and shorter duration compared to Death Blossom, which reduces the chance that the bleed will be cleansed.

D/D evade condi bleed builds are very visible, can be locked down more easily, and have a range problem dealing with kiting builds. Basically, I wouldn’t gain enough utility and new abilities by adding in Death Blossom/Heart Seeker as compared to SB.

One weakness is that projectiles can be blocked/reflected/dodged more easily, of course, but that can be made up for using proper timing and so on.

CnD itself isn’t useless for P/D condi. It’s the combo with steal that can be redundant if you have stealth on steal. As an aside, if it wasn’t for UC and EA being so good together I wouldn’t take Daredevil necessarily. WS is basically a throw away trait for me. It’s just the other two options make no sense on a condi build that doesn’t use physical skills. Dropping a needle-trap on heal and especially the poison duration/on steal that Deadly Arts grant is hugely tempting. I just like the extra dodge/condi clear of Daredevil more in a meta that almost requires constant cleanse to stay alive.

I’d say SP needs a longer term benefit or a personal benefit. Like increase the regeneration to 10 seconds in duration. A personal benefit might be might gain? Hard to do without power creep, but it’s hard to do anything with SP the way it is now.

I use offhand Shortbow for mobility and for clearing camps because the detonated cluster bomb is significant bleed that can clear a lot of NPCs quickly. I can also use the SB evade if I need to contest a point against multiple enemies.

I’d be glad to show you how it plays in Heart of the Mists if you like. [EDIT] Assuming you are not on an EU server :/

And reduced cooldown on Shadowstep. It is a really useful ability that goes from a 50 second to 40 second cooldown with that trait. That means by the time the “Return” ability runs it will again be available in another 30 seconds. 30 seconds is not long. My build outruns other thieves because I have lower cooldowns on teleports like this.

The heal is telegraphed, but the condition clear and regaining stealth is good for a build that can apply constant ranged pressure. It means saving initiative for the next CnD which will, as you say, apply vuln and prepare another Sneak Attack. There are downsides to it, in part because the combination of effects is so useful. I’ve learned to play around those downsides so it’s not something I worry about too often.

I ran this build pre-daredevil. It was Trickery, Shadow Arts, and Deadly Arts. It did more damage that my current build but it also lacked the mobility enhancements of Daredevil. Unhindered Combatant is like an addiction. Once you have it, it’s hard to give it up. Back then the traits were ordered differently, of course, so I had some options that wouldn’t make sense now.

Steal + CnD is a waste of initiative if you gain stealth on steal. Just steal and then Sneak Attack. My damage comes from bleeds, so the CnD isn’t as valuable as you seem to think it is for me. That combo makes sense for power builds where CnD is a significant chunk of damage in its own right.

Hide in Shadows yes, Last Refuge no. I use Concealed defeat because it helps Hide in Shadows. Very necessary given the larger cooldown on that heal. I don’t find SE to be necessary in most situations given the condition clear of Escapist’s Absolution.

Steal on stealth is a good way to regain stealth and get another Sneak Attack off. It also is a blind on steal (combo with CiS). CiS is great for non D/P that don’t have access to abilities that blind as consistently.

I duel all the time and this is how I win them.

I’ve used it to start to res someone, fired off a stealth attack, and then continue resing them in PvE.

I’ve used it to prevent stomps when I interrupt a 2 or 3 v 1 against a person on my server pairing.

I use all of the traits together. Using Sneak Attack is my primary damage. I also have to get in close to use my offhand dagger. So the blind on stealth and damage reduction in stealth is good for me. Being faster in stealth is always good, like superspeed only more available. Stealth on steal is also a golden opportunity for more Sneak Attacks. That cooldown reduction I mentioned? It applies to Hide in Shadows, a highly underrated condition clear, heal, and stealth all in one. It heals me and sets me up for another Sneak Attack.

SA is an offensive trait line for me. And a defensive trait line. My defense and offense merge together.

Acrobatics and Staff share the same synergy. When you attack you can also be evading. When you evade you are setting yourself up for another attack. Synergy. It is how I think of my builds.

I feel like this would break far more than it would fix. SA is mostly in a good place. Stealth on steal is already available to give thief access to stealth on a non-stealth weapon oriented weapon. It also lowers the cooldown of several utilities that also grant stealth. Thief doesn’t lack enough access to stealth to justify creating this trait. Because stealth breaks target this will only be used by other classes to justify more anti-stealth skills.

Some weapon attack patterns also complete much faster. This means Dagger/Dagger will more often be able to complete an attack chain to gain stealth. Other sets will not have that same advantage and be unable to use this trait effectively/as effectively.

Further, to me, gaining stealth is something that should be an active decision on the part of the players and not a baseline modification to auto attack.

As someone who takes the SA trait line all these comments about SA being bad are somewhat strange.

Merciful Ambush prevents so many stomps on allied players. Shadows Embrace is a decent condi clear in a condition heavy meta. Concealed Defeat is not named correctly because the main value is a cooldown reduction on Shadowstep (taking it from 50 seconds to 40 is amazingly helpful). Last Refuge is junk but 2/3 is not bad.

Meld with Shadows, with the stealth attack cooldown, is actually fairly useful in mitigating the awfulness of a 1 second “can’t do anything” nerf that was added without explanation. More time in stealth is more time to try again before losing stealth. Leeching Venoms is a great heal/dps boost/cooldown reduction. Alternatively you can take HT for a huge advantage in combat.

RoS is a huge help—instead of giving us protection as a buff we have an almost unstrippable “buff” (stealth) that reduces incoming damage by 25%. Add in Daredevils UC and we have the regular potential for protection style damage reduction.

CiS is a dream baseline for any offhand dagger thief. The reason is because blind on stealth makes thief even harder to hit and lock down. Rending Shade is a good offensive alternative by turning boonstrip into something any weapon set can apply regularly. SR is less good than in the past but still a solid trait for some builds.

In short—I don’t think SA is as weak and in need of fixing as some people.

Pistol skills are all useful in some regard. Some could use some fine tuning in exchange for finally dealing with the one hit wonder that Unload has become.

The autoattack is useful. Since firing rate was recently increased the damage potential has been considerable without spending initiative. Sure the damage is less than Dagger, but this is a ranged attack with a decent rate of fire. No one should be dodging the auto attack—it would be individually a waste of a dodge—but the damage quickly adds up from constant auto attacking. I might tweak the damage up slightly in exchange for the changes discussed below.

Pistol 2 is extremely useful. Sometimes immobilize for even a short time is what your group needs. If you boost condition durations you will get even more out of this. Personally the only weakness of this is the projectile speed. Consider also that in a P/P set this gives you immobilize to help land a full Unload.

Unload is quite overtuned at the moment. Single target damage is high and it serves as the main single target damage for the build. It is also a one hit wonder, spam until dead kind of attack. I think Unload should be a directional attack that can hit multiple targets. You sacrifice single target accuracy for hitting more targets in a hail of gunfire. Single target damage should be the focus of the Stealth attack.

Pistol 4 is great due to the interrupt it provides, with synergy using PI, and I see no reason to change it.

Black Powder is also strong, due to the smoke field combos, interaction with stolen items, and its own blind. I don’t see a reason to change this.

EDIT—

And as a P/D user I would obviously not condone removing bleed from Sneak Attack or the auto attack. Condition builds use a different stat set to make those bleeds effective so leaving both in makes the pistol a valid option for either.

I find that thief forums are a good source of information. Most players who know how to play a particular build are always willing to share advice on how to play it. A few thieves are multi-thieves who run many different builds—including those outside the meta.

I know that Sauer ran his HoT build for a while before posting it. Once he did it was picked up and became “meta” for some players. Often I think the new “meta” is determined by enterprising players who play a non-meta build until finally other people notice that it is effective (if you know how to play it of course).

My biggest advice for new thief players—re-keybind your utilities and steal. Then build up muscle memory using those skills on the keys. So much improvement in how thief plays—as a twitch/fluid/evasive combatant—can be realized that way.

I have a few questions because a permastealth-trap thief is possible although it should not be dealing a huge amount of damage. Certainly if he is hacking to have no cooldown that would be a reportable offense.

First, if he was perma stealth then how did you see him?

Second, what attacks were showing up in the combat log? Traps do no physical damage so they won’t bring him out of stealth.

Third, how did you experience this “no cooldown?” Traps can be placed on a 24 second cooldown, with additional trap dropped on using a heal skill. This can let the thief drop numerous traps in a short time with a relatively low reset time.

Anyone willing to share a WvW build for a power Reaper? I’m looking for something that could potentially roam, although I understand that escape is not available if I get swarmed by a large number of people.

So I walked by a Yak that had been crippled long term by a Sentry. No one else around. I was on Reaper. Suddenly I get hit with cripple that had a three minute duration. Still no one around so it seems to have been a bug.

In no particular order here are some bugs I’ve noticed recently.

1) There is a bug with rams where the skills will randomly go on cooldown and not actually trigger when you use the skill. I’ve only noticed this effecting skill 1, usually after using skill 2 shortly before.

2) There are an increasing number of random obstructions between my projectiles and targets. I was fighting a camp solo and had to reposition around an invisible wall that suddenly prevented all of my projectiles from hitting the supervisor. Obstructed, obstructed, obstructed.

3) Randomly seeing downed enemies slide away and people who are stunned also continue moving/sliding even though their character is still technically at the same location as before for the hitbox.

4) The 1 second internal cooldown for stealth attacks, other concerns aside, sometimes appears to trigger without an attempt at executing a stealth attack. It’s something I’m still investigating to see when/where this happens.

Not sure on the pants but the boots are Assassin’s Boots.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Assassin's_Boots

I use P/D so I take full advantage where possible of the projectile finishers.

For Healing Seed the finisher is regeneration, whether or not you actually even hit. Even if you are out of range the finisher will still activate, so it is possible to get long duration regeneration on you during a fight. Really helps with survivability. Regen is good if you have it as early in the fight as possible, so I generally like to start with this kind of combo.

For Throw Gunk, the projectile finisher is confusion. Engineers have a lot of abilities to throw around, and my build doesn’t normally use confusion, so adding confusion to my other conditions is a strong combination—assuming the combo works. You need to throw the gunk within range of where you think they will end up. Then you actually need to get to the gunk and perform a Sneak Attack. Harder, but doable. I save this skill for mid fight if the engi is tough enough skill wise to warrant the additional effort of timing and positioning the attack.

1v1 mostly depends on knowing your own opponent. A lot of newer players will spam abilities. Spamming abilities without knowing what your opponent can do can get you killed pretty quickly. Thief has lower HP than most classes so that can be a problem for survivability against classes with more innate tank. Control the fight and you can win. Also, know your combo fields that you can interact with. Ranger healing seed provides a water field. Blast finishers in that field will heal and projectile finishers will provide regeneration.

One good option for learning is to go into Heart of the Mists. You can select all traits/different stats (amulets)/sigils and runes. You can also practice against class NPCs that, while not “good” will give you an idea of some of your rotations, etc. My advice for dragonhunter is to use as many stuns as you can. P/P is one option because of the range potential and because of the pistol 4 stun. You need to interrupt their heals. The giant leap forward is a strong heal/cleanse and worth interrupting. S/P is also a good anti-DH weaponset. Also, in general, you should learn how to use each stolen skill effectively against the class you are stealing from. It is usually free damage/free buffs that can move the fight in your favor.

I would also consider getting Heart of Thorns. Daredevil is a very important traitline to enhancing thief survivability and overall damage. The new zones are fun and promote thief style gameplay, i.e. know your opponent, because lots of creatures have unique mechanics to learn. The story is also better than original GW2 by a mile.

Thief is very viable in PvE. I say this because a while back I ran a number of fractals. One fractal, Mai Trin, my entire party except for me fully died. I used my stealth and evade in order to res my entire party back to life so we didn’t have to reset. Our group utility is that we can do that sort of support better than other classes. I’ve also commanded in Dragons Stand (Heart of Thorns) and been a primary target caller for the tower events (thief is the fastest class in the game if built that way). If you want to do something and aren’t sure how, just ask here or message me in game.

Can confirm that slide happens both when players go down and when they are hit with basi venom. They appear to keep walking. The visual messes up timing attacks and also messes up getting stomps.

This is a significant bug and deserves a lot of attention/acknowledgement by the devs.

I was thinking about a high defense and dodge build based around Power damage that used dodges for maximum effect, so this is what I came up with. Obviously, it is outside the box and I haven’t had a chance to test it out. Other than the runes, it is a Core thief, and need not rely on the S/D set. I used S/D because it has additional condition clears and some evade built into skill 3.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAsYVl0MhenYlTwxJw/EH0El/KSjyQHATYE0jiMMQB-TFSBQBA4EAkH9Bg4QAsSlgVS9HAu/QyU+phnAwmhBghQEAzMzMNiLuQKA2EaB-w

Feedback appreciated.

Bring at least 3 condi clears against a mesmer. That, more than anything, will help you win.

I don’t run 3 condi clears in my build normally. But when I run across a mesmer who is running a strong condi build and is skilled I consider a reset to adjust my traits. All the torment and confusion flying around is too much without significant regular condition clears.

Wear heavier armor. Block. Dodge. Reflect. Line of Sight. Stun. Return fire with ranged attacks to put pressure on them instead. Stealth and jump them.

@Supreme

Your OP (quoting me), was based on P/D weapon set in WvW. So complaining about D/P stealth stacking is fine with me, just so long as you don’t pretend that what I said has anything to do with D/P. P/D doesn’t stack stealth, and in fact cannot stack stealth. Nor do I run Shadow Refuge. You will see me many times before the fight is over.

And yes, I see plenty of roamers on NSP (currently SoS) who are not thieves. I’m more likely to encounter solo roaming Druid or Necro than I am a thief. Just today I ran into multiple solid Herald (rev) players. Dueled them both and was very pleasantly surprised by the quality of the fight. I can’t speak for your server’s experience.

@ventusthunder

You are free to think of it as a win for you. Most of the time I don’t need to hard disengage unless there is outnumbered situation. I also think of victory in terms of killing the yak the people are running into SM, or tying up fighters at a camp so my team faces smaller zergs. Keeping me from an objective is certainly a loss for me, however, so it cuts both ways. If you run a yak I’m trying to kill successfully, then it was well played on your part.

Feel free to friend/message me in game. I’ll be glad to help you as best I can.

Actually there is quite a bit of dodging involved. And no stealth stacking. The thief I saw was popping in and out of stealth regularly. It was impressive from my, then newbie, perspective. This was back when backstab did 12k+ so people were dying left and right.

And I see far more people roaming on mesmer, on warrior, on DH, and other classes than I see thieves. Honestly, if you actually played thief you would understand that there aren’t that many running around, and certainly not more than other classes proportionally.

And that wasn’t stall. That was fight and kill. And if you are defending an objective that is part of WvW as well. And it’s not easy. That’s why I said “aspire.” It is something that takes practice and timing and knowing your build inside and out. And it takes knowing what they are playing and how their build likely works. (I’m sure that the guy I saw wasn’t fighting the best players either).

BTW, thanks for the title “Apex Predator.” If only that reflected the reality for your average thief.

We will just have to disagree then.

I consider a reset to be a draw. Both the thief and the target go out of combat, so the regeneration and skills going off cooldown is the same for both. The thief doesn’t want to need to reset the fight, because burning their cooldowns is important to create openings against many classes. For tanky classes their heal will be back up the fastest, which creates more of a pain for the thief trying to get the kill.

It isn’t a loss because thief mobility is a part of the class, as is stepping out of combat when things aren’t working out. But it certainly isn’t a win either. If the question is victory there are two standards: getting them down and stomping them. Getting them down is far easier, the stomp is harder when dealing with multiple people.

And roaming is all about dealing with multiples. Server 1 v Server 2 is always a risk that Server 3’s zerg comes along to try and flatten you both. Years ago I saw a thief take on 3 or four people at once. It was impressive to watch—as his enemy—and gave me something to aspire to. That is what roaming is to me. Aspiring to be good enough to stand before four people alone and strike fear into their hearts.

I learned something new about Necromancer today. They have a pet that builds in a teleport/stunbreak on demand. Makes for a much more interesting fight.

Supreme thanks for quoting me in OP

As it stands, winning vs all classes is possible. Just because I outlined a possible path to victory doesn’t make it easy or automatic. Check my signature for video of some of my gameplay. I fight a DH at the end of the video. I win. shrug

I like to fight good players in 1v1. Being forced to go up to 100% effort to get a kill is one of the joys of fighting those players. I don’t just mean 100% effort to overcome the tank of some classes/builds. I mean 100% effort to both deal and avoid damage.

I don’t mind being crushed by a good condi-mesmer because I’ve fought bad condi mesmers and know how easy it can be to kill them. It does take skill to properly manage your class and so if I lose it is often to a skilled player. Same for the other classes.

I dislike playing against 3v1 constantly. As a solo roamer that is often the case. I roam both for fights and for taking out yaks and camps and destroying the gate siege on keeps. If I have to, I’ll switch targets if I’m being 3v1’ed by good players who will res one another 85/100 downs. That is part of the game but I prefer situations where I can fight 1v1 against builds that are tanky enough that +1s complicate the fight.

ANET should make a new larger arena map/game mode. The map would have its’ own button like PvP/WvW and would have 6–12 smaller mini arenas in a circle around a larger central starting platform. A player enters the arena queue and starts in the lowest arena. A win in the arena means the player advances to the next higher arena. People who lose move down a slot and fight the loser of the previous arena. Those losing in the first arena get kicked to the viewing area. If a player resigns then players will move up according to their ranking accordingly. Fights that last longer than five minutes will be declared a draw and a random player will be assigned “winner” and move up as normal.

You can instance the arena and have as many as are needed for duelers from all servers. This avoids having to use guild halls which are good for private practice but not for dueling and watching duels.

The new dueling arena could award titles/achievements for reaching the top, for holding the top position for X number of fights, and the like.

I would make each “arena” a different mini-map with different terrain. If possible, I would also allow those in the center area to use observer mode on individual players or on specific arenas to either let them follow a dueler they like or follow the arena in general—like the top tier one.

I think this would (1) address the lack of 1v1 dueling support, (2) create new content and interest in a new competitive PvP gamemode, (3) bring players from different WvW servers against one another in limited combat without having to transfer. Overall this is a quality of life enhancement to a game that needs some fresh ideas for PvP to keep it relevant to older players and players considering picking up the game.

Another backstab suggestion. Make Shadowshot blockable and simply move unblockable to backstab.

My current balance ideas are:

I’d change backstab to either an unblockable attack that cannot crit or an attack that is unblockable but cannot crit while a person is blocking.

I’d change dancing dagger to include poison. This opens up a method for poison access without having to switch to SB, which is the only source of poison unless a thief is traited.

I would also change the duration of the poison field on SB to be longer. This could be adjusted with a slightly smaller radius for the purposes of balance. Either way, the field needs to last long enough to give more opportunities for combos in the field.

I would also suggest changing the ICD after a missed stealth attack to 0.5 seconds. One second feels clunky on thief and impacts certain builds, like S/X, more than builds like P/D where it doesn’t really effect most fights. Even 0.75 seconds would improve the situation significantly.

I would also restore the share radius of venomshare to at least 300. Alternatively I would increase the range to 600 and decrease the total share targets to 3. This would be more consistent in terms of the number of people receiving venoms and therefore easier to balance around.

I would remove some of the bleed on Death Blossom and add bleed to Heartseeker. More bleed stacks would be applied depending on the HP of the target when hit, as with the damage scaling.

I’d remove some of the damage on Shadowshot while increasing the damage on backstab.

I’d make the trickery initiative pool increase baseline. I would replace this trait with an increase in initiative regeneration. This makes skills’ initiative use easier to balance around. It also opens up other trait lines for people to use.

It should be noted I run Hide in Shadows, so I have extra condition removal that way. If I really needed to I could add in the condition removal in stealth but I don’t need to use that as much with the plex nerf.

In general a bunker build or class is going to require a player to be aggressive. Aggressive doesn’t mean that the player ignores defense. Rather, it means that the player has to deal consistent pressure. Lots of sustain builds have some temporary heal/block/super tank ability that only triggers once every so often. If you apply pressure when that isn’t up the player often has fewer options. This is when you will see the warrior dodge for instance.

Warriors who are good are constantly attacking. They are usually very natural in how they use their mobility skills during combat along with stuns to lock you down for a burst. Headbutt is a good example of this kind of mobility/stun/burst. They understand that when a thief goes into stealth they are not actually gone. Lots of warriors use weapon swapping as part of their rotation so they just keep swapping and attacking while predicting where they need to move to strike at the thief.

I find that warriors, even good ones, die to my build because they can’t reach me. P/D ³ is a backwards teleport that is perfect for kiting. Add in some dodges from daredevil and stealth and warriors have a hard time reaching me. Warriors don’t, in general, excel at ranged damage.

I can’t say, having never played Rev before what they did or didn’t do. They certainly weren’t running this build. http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vlAQRApX5unvNeNS6JvJRVlHlsrykSYW5SJYssrklTlxe92rXdjOKJNgEeA-T1RTABF+AAM8EAMr+BA2f4IlgXo8jL1fAA-w There are power variations I could think up fairly easily, but this seemed to synergize well with a resistance granting build. It isn’t as “nice” of a build for groups, but solo roaming is about keeping yourself alive first so…

I WvW, so I’ll post about that. My main is P/D condition/venom/stealth focused.

Elementalist: Most fights I can win unless the person is running a sustain build with lots of condition clear. Most people run a lighter build to do more damage so I can win these fights regularly. Always a good target, but in group fights can be problematic with mist form allowing more time for the team to res them.

Necromancer: Most fights I can win, a few necromancers run dangerous condi transfer builds that can pose a problem, but mostly they lack the mobility to catch me, especially in reaper form. Good ranged damage can shut them down. Harder with shroud to break, but a good target in group fights because other players aren’t worried about the necro’s HP going low because of shroud.

Mesmers: Good mesmers are hard but if the mesmer isn’t using high stealth uptime it quickly becomes a game of burst and stealth. The mesmer goes down pretty fast. Mesmers are annoying if they can get their balance and start attacking, so in group fights mesmers are high priority to take down.

Engineers: Good engineers have sustain but the stolen skill interacts with finishers really well. The main thing with scrappers is just waiting out the defensive abilities and then bursting. Using boonsteal in generally makes engineers easier to kill and control.

Rangers: I’ve been matched once by a greatsword ranger and a staff druid. Both had strong sustain, powerful damage, and good mobility. I find that rangers and druids that stand still to do their damage, because they “can,” tend to die easily. Using the stolen skill to gain regeneration and heals helps to negate their damage by quite a bit. Rangers pets are also gold for offhand dagger use because the pet won’t move much so it is easy to CnD off that to regain stealth for another attack.

Thief: I find most thieves run insane condi clear. They are easy kills if they don’t. With teleport and enough condi clears getting a kill can be a challenge. Most will run Escapist’s Absolution, which means timing a burst and then not attacking is key to decreasing their HP. Having an enemy NPC, like a sentry nearby is helpful to maintain the advantage by being in stealth more than them. “Winning” against a thief often means forcing it to retreat so you can take the objective.

Warrior: Hit the warrior enough to force them to use their immunities. Also evade their adrenal abilities, both because of the damage and because they will probably heal from it. Basically, burst and retreat, burst and retreat. If you never get locked down you can win. That said, you can tell a good warrior from a bad one pretty quickly. A good warrior will maintain pressure and will catch you with his/her abilities. A bad warrior will let you hit and run until death.

Guardians: hit and run until their passives/blocks are gone. Then melt them. Guardians have such small HP that medium constant pressure will win. Even bunkers should melt to a combination of boonsteal and careful pressure. Also, some well timed interrupts from stolen skill are powerful tools to shutting them down.

Revenants: die. They have a few powerful heals and some chasing ability, but boonspam is the most common type. They are built for group support and quickly die against focused 1v1 fire. It is also more rare for me to encounter good rev players. I’ve seen maybe one who had built for solo roaming and was amazing. Most others I see are running in groups so their build is not designed, perhaps, for solo roaming.

No, you can see the trap being placed, even while the person is in stealth. I’ve fought them before. Like, this isn’t hard. Ranger has a knockdown trap that can probably disrupt the perma stealth long enough to get Sic Em off.

And being obstructed by the air is a big problem. It’s also a bug. I can’t assume a bug as the baseline for my suggestions. And I’m not saying all my suggestions have a 100% success rate either. Or that they are easy. Rather than simply say “learn to play” I’m trying to offer constructive ideas for how a person might fight someone who is trolling around on this build.

And for the record, any thief who wants a stronger condition build should be appearing and attacking. There is a lot more condition pressure available that way. Trapper thief is, quite frankly, inferior.

That build will die very quickly if you get locked down. You have a few stun breaks but immobilize will be very hard to deal with. Still, I have to say I like the idea of people playing around with different things. Take a look at this armor set, it might be less “one-shot” but might get you killed less often (swapping out the traits/weapons/utilities to your build of course).

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQJAWVl8MhCnYpTw5JQ/ELUFVXCEANwWOOYV3c1v9jPA-T1CBQBFZ/BFquSmUpYLKXAwDAYdHBAJcBA0nuAlpkiBHCAWqEMAACwN3Z2cnBO6RP6RP6R7m38o38o3sUAiu0C-w

First, Anet themselves removed direct damage from thief traps to promote this kind of gameplay.

Second, the ability to clear conditions regularly renders this kind of build almost useless. If someone doesn’t carry condition clear they are dead regardless of whether the player is attacking from stealth or not. What people who don’t play condition builds don’t understand is that condition builds must regularly apply conditions, in sufficient quantities, in order to overcome both condition clears and healing. A trapper build generally cannot apply sufficient conditions without leaving stealth and a few condition clears will mean there is zero pressure on the target.

Third, there are anti-stealth abilities on the ranger, on the scrapper, and on the anti-stealth trap. There is also stealth, which itself is a counter to someone using stealth. These abilities exist for a reason in a game where one of the main classes was originally designed around using stealth to both evade damage and deal damage. Calling for an end to stealth is basically asking Anet, unreasonably, to re-invent the entire class to make PvP easier for you.

Fourth, this build is a short range build. This means traps that you lay down are going to be effective. Using abilities when the traps go off that can disrupt stealth stacking may reveal the thief without having to do anything. A DH might, for example, use a knockback arrow aimed at the blackpowder circle to stop the thief from stacking stealth.

Finally, you can also see the traps when they are initially placed down. Dodge through the trap to not get hit at all. I’ve done this several times against a thief, not perma stealth but with high uptime, who was using traps on me. Seeing the traps was huge, I didn’t even need to cleanse because evading through the trap negated the damage completely.

I have never seen a perma stealth trapper thief deal me, or anyone else, an 8k+ tick of damage. I’ve fought only one single thief who used traps, actively with non-perma stealth gameplay, and actually dealt any significant damage.

Again, if the person was hit with basilisk venom then the person must have come out of stealth in some fashion. In that case, assuming he never saw the thief and died very quickly, it seems safe to assume that it was hacking.

Some general advice because OP didn’t specify sPvP or WvW.

Rule 1 when playing thief: don’t over commit. If you can’t kill instantly try to keep pressure up without over extending yourself.

Rule 2 when playing thief: know when/how to disengage if fight turns against you. Thief has best disengage in the game, learn to predict when you should use this advantage.

Rule 3 when playing thief: know your enemy to help with 1 and 2. Don’t hard engage a Dragonhunter, for example.

Rule 4 when playing thief: know how to use each of the stolen skills to your advantage against the class you are fighting.

Try P/D because it isn’t facerolling.