Leeching Venoms

Why is this in a stealth based specialization still after all this time. I know people have brought it up but it is a getting a little ridiculous. For years every time there is a patch I look for this change. It is a dead trait that is either been overlooked or shows some level of incompetence by the development staff. The dev's probably have not addressed it because of balance sake in both PvE and PvP but that is not really an excuse as they are always releasing balance patches. It just looks sloppy and poorly planed sitting there in Shadow Arts.

It's in there bc Leeching Venom is a damage mitigation trait, whereas Deadly Arts is a damage-oriented line. It simply wouldn't make sense to have it there. It's much more in line with a sustain line like shadow arts.

@"Phosphorite.6192" said:It's in there bc Leeching Venom is a damage mitigation trait, whereas Deadly Arts is a damage-oriented line. It simply wouldn't make sense to have it there. It's much more in line with a sustain line like shadow arts.

What you say makes complete sense but there is not any other supporting traits for Venoms in Shadow Arts. That is why I say poorly planned. The trait should either be moved, dropped. They could add new traits in Shadow Arts that support a condi based damage mitigation build but even the minor traits in Shadow Arts negate the use of this specialization in a condi build .

From the wiki "Shadow Arts is a core specialization for the thief that focuses on survival, defensive abilities, and stealth." and out 12 traits 10 are directly related to stealth. 1 Venom and 1 related to reducing cooldown of Deception skills which include stealth so you could consider that 11. Its a dead trait.

@Blixxis.6798 said:

@"Phosphorite.6192" said:It's in there bc Leeching Venom is a damage mitigation trait, whereas Deadly Arts is a damage-oriented line. It simply wouldn't make sense to have it there. It's much more in line with a sustain line like shadow arts.

It's in the quote you pulled. Leeching Venoms is a Survival ability. It's not a dead trait, and it does actually see use. Not as much as I'd personally like however, due to most armor for healing power has very little synergy with Thief's stats.

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:

@Blixxis.6798 said:

@"Phosphorite.6192" said:It's in there bc Leeching Venom is a damage mitigation trait, whereas Deadly Arts is a damage-oriented line. It simply wouldn't make sense to have it there. It's much more in line with a sustain line like shadow arts.

I didn't post the quote because of my lack of understanding on if it's a survival trait or not. l posted it to show that despite their definition 11 of the 12 traits are stealth based and more focused on one kind of play.

The point is Leaching Venoms has no synergy with in the entire specialization and the loss for going in to Shadow Arts over a specialization more focaused on condition is not worth the trait. The specialization is poorly planned out and instead of providing a nice range of mitigation in different ways the thief can be played, it instead all turned in to stealth but one ability and now it's out of place.

Maybe some people use it in some condi/stealth hybrid PvP build but realistically it's just waste sitting where it is.

Saying Leeching Venoms should be in SA because it's a survival ability is like saying that IP should be in SA because it's a survival ability. SA has literally nothing to do with venoms. You can't even "envenom" someone while in stealth unless you go Thieves guild or something. If it were in DA, it could at least synergize with lotus poison and exposed weakness for sure. And panic strike or potent poison or both depending on where Leeching Venoms go.