Binding Shadow and BQoBK

These two abilities of the DE are very problematic for the game. Binding Shadow is far and away the best skill a rifle DE can take thanks to it being able to do everything. Buffing the DEs damage, Immobilizing the foe, removing and boons that might protect them like Protection or Stab, and knocking them down (and they get poisoned to boot). All this while the visual tell is very subtle and the thief can precast it from stealth before marking the target and preshooting their DJ. Shadow Gust and Shadow flare are not taken at all in the current meta as far as I'm aware. Why not move the Immobilize over to Shadow Flare and the Boon removal over to Shadow Gust. That way players can SG to remove stability and protection and knock back the foe. They then BS to knock them down and apply vuln and poison before blowing them up. Adding the Immob to SF would improve that skill greatly as the foes would not be able to easily walk out of the aoe damage. It would also make the DE harder to catch which is what they want. I would also recommend making the tell on BS more visible.

As far as Be Quick or Be Killed, this trait has been taken over all the others from the very beginning for good reason. I think one of the best ways to tackle this trait is to make it condition oriented so that players don't instantly die when a deadeye gets their Malicious Stealth attack off thanks to this trait. I would make it so that the DE gets -400 Power, +200 Precision and +200 Condition Damage while they have Quickness. Either that or -400 Power and the DE applies poison/bleed on attacks while he has Quickness.

(Regarding BQoBK)Now in my personal opinion thief needs more build options not less. They seemed to be getting pidgeon holed lately and I don't think your suggestion would help in that respect. Maybe just add some form of Condi damage to it without hurting power?I would like to see more love for old specs that have fallen out. They kind of did that with P/D but it's underwhelming.

I’d agree that moving the anti-boon to SG makes sense. BS is pretty singularly strong and the other skills could use some love.

That being the case I don’t think there are issues with the Grandmaster traits. One is more support oriented. One is burst oriented. One is sustain oriented. All are pretty different it’s just many wanted to play burst given the meta. That’s not a trait issue so much as a meta issue.

Also this thread should be moved to Thief subforum.

@saerni.2584 said:I’d agree that moving the anti-boon to SG makes sense. BS is pretty singularly strong and the other skills could use some love.

That being the case I don’t think there are issues with the Grandmaster traits. One is more support oriented. One is burst oriented. One is sustain oriented. All are pretty different it’s just many wanted to play burst given the meta. That’s not a trait issue so much as a meta issue.

id say BQoBK is frontloaded, m7 has higher bursts but later in the fight ontop of sustaining resources, yet you do not have time in spvp. overall id say m7 is overloaded compared to BQoBK, but frontloading dmg is just too important in spvp.

@MUDse.7623 said:

@saerni.2584 said:I’d agree that moving the anti-boon to SG makes sense. BS is pretty singularly strong and the other skills could use some love.

That being the case I don’t think there are issues with the Grandmaster traits. One is more support oriented. One is burst oriented. One is sustain oriented. All are pretty different it’s just many wanted to play burst given the meta. That’s not a trait issue so much as a meta issue.

I count front loading as burst. But overall there are real trade offs to using them and it’s not unfair to invest heavily in quickness to get the bonus stats from the grandmaster.

@Tycura.1982 said:(Regarding BQoBK)Now in my personal opinion thief needs more build options not less. They seemed to be getting pidgeon holed lately and I don't think your suggestion would help in that respect. Maybe just add some form of Condi damage to it without hurting power?I would like to see more love for old specs that have fallen out. They kind of did that with P/D but it's underwhelming.

To give thief more build options. Theyd need to do something about initiative expenses and trickery's preparedness. In the past thief could get by without it. But with all the changes up to this point they can't.

Adjusting weapon sets and fixing/updating their utilities is also needed.

@saerni.2584 said:Also this thread should be moved to Thief subforum.

I would have except no one in sPVP would see it. . .

@saerni.2584 said:I’d agree that moving the anti-boon to SG makes sense. BS is pretty singularly strong and the other skills could use some love.

That being the case I don’t think there are issues with the Grandmaster traits. One is more support oriented. One is burst oriented. One is sustain oriented. All are pretty different it’s just many wanted to play burst given the meta. That’s not a trait issue so much as a meta issue.

It's an issue because of the respawn times in the game. Thieves don't hold points generally, and DE NEVER holds a point. Thieves are useful in how fast they can finish a foe. Unfortunately, players respawn in 15 seconds! That means that the thief needs to be killing players quickly and regularly so the other team is down a man most of the time. I have played M7 on my DE for quite a few matches, and even when I play it perfectly and burst up my Malice quickly enough for the 1HK, too much time has gone by and I am being a detriment to my team. That is also assuming that I even land the DJ. BQoBK would probably still be meta if they removed the Power and Precision bonuses. That's how strong Quickness is in the current iteration of the game. Also if something is a meta issue then it is a game issue. The meta can only be what it is thanks to the game design and balance.