Thief

The previous Shadow Arts update landed pretty well overall, but we think that the siphons ended up a little weak. We're tuning these up a bit, as well as touching up a few other traits that didn't feel quite right. In addition to these changes, we're updating Improvisation to recharge a random utility skill on the skill bar rather than a random utility skill type. This change is intended to lower the variance on the trait and to allow for more flexibility in utility selection. Finally, stolen bundles now use the ammo system in order to help with readability.

• Steal: Fixed a bug that could cause the shadowstep to fail in rare situations.

• Swipe: Fixed a bug that could cause the shadowstep to fail in rare situations. Reduced recharge from 30 seconds to 25 seconds.

• Hidden Thief: Fixed a bug that could cause this trait to activate even if Steal failed.

• Leeching Venoms: This trait now immediately grants a stack of spider venom when the thief first enters stealth and every 3 seconds after.

• Improvisation: Instead of recharging an entire skill category at random, this trait now recharges one of your equipped utility skills at random.

  Can Improvisation recharge my Heal or Elite?Improvisation recharges one of your utility skills. It does not recharge the Heal or the Elite.

• Stolen Bundles: Stolen bundles now show their number of uses as ammunition.

• Shadow Siphoning: Increased base healing by 62%.

• Cloaked in Shadow: Increased base damage and the damage multiplier by 100%. Increased base healing by 100% and the heal multiplier by 60%.

• Lead Attacks: Fixed a bug that caused this trait to grant less than the listed 15% recharge reduction.

Rest of the patch for the others professions:https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/88470/upcoming-balance-notes-10-1-2019

So I don’t see the much discussed Deadly Ambition change....

Interesting

@saerni.2584 said:So I don’t see the much discussed Deadly Ambition change....

Interesting

I guess Anet saw too many people didn't want that change.Edit - Before it was a good burst but if they did the change then it will nuff the burst and give it a more consistent poison application if and only if you are still attacking it every 2 secs. Nerf to condi mostly.

The improv change is solid. It at least addresses the issue that was a category not equipped still being factored in.

I dont know why they are so careful with the siphon traits. Both of them are atrociously terrible. Noone uses them because they are that bad. Cloaked in Shadow couldve been buffed by 1000% and it would still not be good. Either revert both of them (lets be real here, the previous versions were vastly superior) or straight up go in with the buffs (1000% on Cloaked in Shadow, or 1500% with a restriction to single target, at least 300% for Shadow Siphon).

25 sec baseline cd for swipe meaning that traited with trickery it will be 16.75 sec cd, this is the single biggest buff on the entire theif section.If you play acro/trickery/daredevil with sword/x and swindler's equilibrium in theory you will be able to swipe every ~11.9 seconds (or 8.4 sec, i am not sure whether the trait reduces the recharge based on the current swipe cd or the maximum cd), with all the usual on steal traits from trickery + endurance thief and all of that is unblockable.

Screw condi daredevil i am rolling sword/dagger or staff on a power set up.

As usual any sustain traits the pass to thief are far to conservative rendering them no use by almost all players. Why do they waste their time and efforts? Wheres the slight dagger, pistol dps buffs so they have a chance to match s/d? Not that s/d really hits hard lol

@"foste.3098" said:25 sec baseline cd for swipe meaning that traited with trickery it will be 16.75 sec cd, this is the single biggest buff on the entire theif section.Not sure if you run it but don't forget the "Improvisation" change too!

If you play acro/trickery/daredevil with sword/x and swindler's equilibrium in theory you will be able to swipe every ~11.9 seconds (or 8.4 sec, i am not sure whether the trait reduces the recharge based on the current swipe cd or the maximum cd), with all the usual on steal traits from trickery + endurance thief and all of that is unblockable.

It is the maximum. 30 seconds is without any cd applied by traist for swipe.

@Xenji.4907 said:

@"foste.3098" said:25 sec baseline cd for swipe meaning that traited with trickery it will be 16.75 sec cd, this is the single biggest buff on the entire theif section.Not sure if you run it but don't forget the "Improvisation" change too!

If you play acro/trickery/daredevil with sword/x and swindler's equilibrium in theory you will be able to swipe every ~11.9 seconds (or 8.4 sec, i am not sure whether the trait reduces the recharge based on the current swipe cd or the maximum cd), with all the usual on steal traits from trickery + endurance thief and all of that is unblockable.

I believe its gonna be base 25 sec after patch no?

Curious that they removed deadly ambition changes, i guess they don't want it to be a passive permanent poison machine. If they really want to balance that trait out they should change it to work in the same way necromancer's plague sending works in that it is a trait that gives you a buff which makes your next attack do x.So in our case it would be something akin to: after you evade/drop below x initiative/use a dual attack/wepon swap/ect, your next attack inflicts y poison stacks lasting z seconds, Δ sec icd.

@Psycoprophet.8107 said:I believe its gonna be base 25 sec after patch no?

Correct.

Interesting that they are going back and tweaking shadow arts again. But why won't they fix Rending Shade to fear around your target instead of yourself? Makes that aspect of the trait worthless with ranged stealth attacks.

@"Xenji.4907" said:

Thief

• Swipe: Reduced recharge from 30 seconds to 25 seconds.

This is big. This put it inline with Deadeye Mark which is also 25s CD.

• Leeching Venoms: This trait now immediately grants a stack of spider venom when the thief first enters stealth and every 3 seconds after.

It still not good enough to compete against Flickering Shadows.

Here's the problem. Typically, in order to prevent telegraphing when activating a Venom, I would go in stealth. Now there is a conflict since Leeching will now override my utility venom (i.e. Devourer Venom). This becomes a problem when I don't want my Skelk Venom interrupted and use it in stealth.

The current iteration of Leeching is in conflict with other Venoms preventing me from using them in stealth. I lose tactical advantage if I take Leeching and other Venoms.

Now if the Venom application while in stealth only triggers if I currently have no other Venom active would be a better iteration of this trait. At its current state, it's unusable.

• Improvisation: Instead of recharging an entire skill category at random, this trait now recharges one of your equipped utility skills at random.

Question: I don't like the wording on this. "Utility Skills" only means one of the 3 utility skills equipped not including healing and elite skills. If it includes healing and elite, it might not be too bad. But if "utility skills" only...aaahh...no thank you. Resetting an Elite skill is the only reason I would take this.

• Shadow Siphoning: Increased base healing by 62%.
• Cloaked in Shadow: Increased base damage and the damage multiplier by 100%. Increased base healing by 100% and the heal multiplier by 60%.

I've been trying to make the life siphoning to work with my S/D (front stab tactical strike siphon) but it's not showing good numbers. It seems that this change looks good but not sure if it will be enough.

My DA/SA/DD S/D is loving these upcoming changes, except for Leeching and Improv.

they actually buffed condi thief indirectly by the swipe reduction, l m a o what a joke of a company

@Elxdark.9702 said:they actually buffed condi thief indirectly by the swipe reduction, l m a o what a joke of a company

Lol honestly the games a pile at this point,does it really surprise u?

Most of what I had in mind to say about that was already mentioned here in one way or other.However, I have to express my disappointment (yet definitely not surprised) how Condi S/D was not touched/adjusted at all except getting buffed through the Swipe change.Overall I am just happy it was not filled with the usual "we nerfed this and this, this, this too oh and that as well"

@Elxdark.9702 said:they actually buffed condi thief indirectly by the swipe reduction, l m a o what a joke of a company

?????????

Actually with the upgraded application on Leeching Venoms condi aspects are being buffed across the board for all builds.

I’m not 100% comfortable saying that the Deadly Ambition changes won’t be in this patch, just because it might still be in testing and they have a week to adjust it and then include it on the patch notes.

That said, the changes will be improvements on the life steal aspect of Shadow Arts, but I’ll withhold on whether it will be significant enough to justify over Rending Shade, which remains one of the stronger choices just due to the boon spam heavy meta and the need to cut through resistance to use blind, weakness, and cripple to actually stand toe to toe with quite a few professions 1v1.

So again nothing.. Alright. Gonna be back after 3-4 months to check again.

@Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

@"Xenji.4907" said:

• Improvisation: Instead of recharging an entire skill category at random, this trait now recharges one of your equipped utility skills at random.

I can't believe I didn't notice that. Shooot... this concerns me. Are they quietly getting rid of dagger storm improv COMBO!?

@Xenji.4907 said:

@Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

@Xenji.4907 said:

• Improvisation: Instead of recharging an entire skill category at random, this trait now recharges one of your equipped utility skills at random.

Yeah, it's very carefully worded and quite sneaky.

I really do not see much in the way of downsides to the patches for thief. Of the changed SA skills I am still leery on the benefits of taking CIS. I really am going to have to test this further. In particular how that siphoning works against multiple enemies and a blind or with Combo's used in a field as it would appear those the times the skill maximized.

As commented elsewhere the changes to improv might be a boost as far as I am concerned if that wording means what I think it does. I really did not use it just for that dagger storm reuse as much as others seem to have.

If it a sure thing rest of any one of those utility skills on cool down , it will be fine and especially in a build that can reuse steal more easily via mercy or the s/x reset. The lower cool down on swipe also helps here.

@babazhook.6805 said:I really do not see much in the way of downsides to the patches for thief. Of the changed SA skills I am still leery on the benefits of taking CIS. I really am going to have to test this further. In particular how that siphoning works against multiple enemies and a blind or with Combo's used in a field as it would appear those the times the skill maximized.

As commented elsewhere the changes to improv might be a boost as far as I am concerned if that wording means what I think it does. I really did not use it just for that dagger storm reuse as much as others seem to have.

If it a sure thing rest of any one of those utility skills on cool down , it will be fine and especially in a build that can reuse steal more easily via mercy or the s/x reset. The lower cool down on swipe also helps here.

CiS is still a gigantic downgrade from the previous versions. It does siphon from every single blinded foe, but you have to get a total of 15 blinds just to gain as much healing as stopping the crit from 1 autoattack wouldve done. So even in the least useful scenario for the old CiS, it still massively outperforms the current one (Among other things because you dont get 15 blinds ever. Even Black Powder into Heartseeker, with both hitting 5 players is only 10 players. ). The current version is so insanely undertuned, that a 1000% buff would not even make it good.

Traits will as before see little use due to as usual anet being to conservative with any changes to thief that lean towards buffs. Ever notice most buffs in past while to thieves are generally taken as nerfs by some and buffs to others depending on how their looked at? Not all but most. New preperation look great but I barely see anyone use them afterthe the first month of their addition. Swipe CD reduction is nice but 1200 range woulda been better.

@UNOwen.7132

Use Smoke Screen and Pistol or Rifle. Blinds for days. Not saying the updated numbers will be enough but if you want to try using the trait the best way is to Sneak Attack through the Smoke Screen (each bullet is a 100% finisher and applies a total of 5 blinds if all shots hit). Dancing Dagger is also a 100% finisher.

TLDR: drop Smoke Screen and combo projectiles through it at a busy mid fight and you will blind a lot of targets.