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Daredevil build with >70% Evade Uptime?


Arklite.4013

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I don't want to share the build because it is absolutely stupid to fight and play. However, I'll link a timestamp in Kate's stream where you can see me on the map holding my team's cap while 1v3ing for 2 minutes on marauders amulet lol.

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/467366105?t=2h48m40s

Watch till about 2h 50m 30s

My thief is Guild Executioner and you can look at my health (it was full the entire time) over the course of the 1v3. Also, I'm fighting at far so you can see the icons of the Weaver, Mirage, and DH there.

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@Arklite.4013 said:

@Arklite.4013 said:Thanks to the people writing legitimate responses. The circus clowns have a place too.

To clarify on my original post, yes, 90% evade uptime was an exaggeration, as @"babazhook.6805" and others mentioned, he dodged almost all of my attacks, which isn't indicative of his actual evade uptime. The 6 minute estimate was not an exaggeration, and I have no doubt it could've gone on longer had the game not ended. I was core warrior, which doesn't have that many attacks, and he was spamming jump, which made it visually confusing. However, I was making a conscious effort to land my attacks between his evades and was totally dumbfounded by how many were constantly evaded. We were pretty much on top of eachother the whole time and I was aiming to have a hitbox out as often as possible. He used a signet or two FWIW. I know there are DD builds out there with lots of evade uptime but this seem absurd as someone who's seen a lot of absurd things in my 6 years on this game.

Well, first thing, 90% evade uptime is what's absurd since it's not reality. Evasion windows ranges from 1/2s to 3/4s, with the exception of Instant Reflex and Daggerstorm. Even if you factor all the evasion in, it will not grant a 90% evade uptime. The math don't lie.

Second, in any PvP games I've seen and participated in not once that someone was left alone in a point fighting 1v1 for more than 1 minute. I'm not sure if your team mates were laying eggs somewhere on the map that they didn't bother rotating, or maybe they're just sitting around eating popcorn watching you struggle against a squishy Thief. The fact that players are constantly rotating, your claim of fighting 1v1 for 6 minutes is implausible.

Now it seems to me that this is a perception issue. Just like many complains about Thief, they are based on what they think they saw instead of what actually had happen. In this case, we have an unreliable witness.

So here's the challenge; Try to replicate the DD build and see if you can get 90% evade uptime and last for 6 minutes on a point. Don't forget to jump around to confuse your opponent -- it's very important. Only then you'll find your answer and realize that none of what you've claimed here is plausible.

See above on the aforementioned 90% figure. Evidently I made the mistake of believing people would see a figure like "90%" and understand that it is an exaggeration. I will not make this mistake on the thief forums again.

I had other players come and fight on the point with me but I asked them to leave and do something elsewhere. The point was under our control at the time and I was more interested in the thief I was fighting than in killing him.

I do not know what build he was using. I am neither creative nor skilled enough to recreate it. I am not concerned enough to attempt it. I was intrigued enough to ask the thief forums about it.

Thanks.

Your mistake is presuming that people will believe your exaggerations without data to back it up...and it's kinda insulting, really.

If you're curious about the build, then ask about it without making things up.

Just like everything else, the only real and substantive way to know for sure about a build is to play the build yourself. Or at the very least, do yourself a favor of researching the build so the next time you find a Thief with similar build, you'll know how to beat it. Everyone here conducts similar research. I personally have level 80 character for each profession. I play them so I'll know them.

Back before the Elite Specs, there was a build called Endless Dodger which is more bunker than the current iteration because Feline Grace was so good.

You claim that you're playing GW2 for 6 years and know nothing about Thief builds? That's another thing that makes your claim even less credible.

EDIT: typos

Well considering I don't record my matches and the results screen doesn't really include any helpful information, I'm not sure what kind of data you would expect me to present. This wasn't a researched post. It wasn't a comparison to an attempt I had made. I only asked with the information I had and the assumption that users on the forum would be familiar enough to point me in the right direction.

The data I'm talking about is the answer to the very first question; Is 90% evasion time even possible?

Researching for an answer to that question would provide you with data that the answer is objectively a "no."

That would have given you a helpful insight on how you would phrase your question here.

Then, when you research for the next question; Can a Thief sustain a 90% evasion time for 6 minutes?

You will find data that the answer is objectively "not possible."

Those two questions answered by your researched data would leave you to ask a simple question; What build gives Thief staying power on the node?

No exaggerations. No false presumptions. Those things are historically dangerous to the health of the Thief profession.

I have been playing for longer than 6 years I believe. I leveled a thief to 80. I just don't enjoy the class very much so I haven't touched it since. To quote my previous comment, "I do not know what build he was using. I am neither creative nor skilled enough to recreate it. I am not concerned enough to attempt it."

Well, if that is your position and attitude, then how would you know?

Your experience fighting against such build already triggered your curiosity yet you still didn't want to explore the Thief profession?

Even if you don't play the Thief profession, it's still beneficial for you to at least understand their mechanics.

To answer your original question, no such Thief build exists.

But to answer the "simple question" above; If I would build it, it will look like this - http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PawAYxjlNw6YXsFGJmUXbtaA-zZZ8IyUF4wB focusing on evasion, initiative gain, and 100% boon duration. Enjoy.

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@"Sir Vincent III.1286" said:But to answer the "simple question" above; If I would build it, it will look like this - http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PawAYxjlNw6YXsFGJmUXbtaA-zZZ8IyUF4wB focusing on evasion, initiative gain, and 100% boon duration. Enjoy.

Pretty close to a build I run (which was based on the build in the video I posted), especially before the last patch. Main difference is that I ran Shortbow instead of Sword/Dagger - partially because I've found that sword/dagger doesn't really work for me, partially because I like having a ranged option, partially because it allows the option of stealth stacking using Smoke Screen, and primarily because the build is still oriented towards capping uncontested nodes, it's just that its other domain is holding those nodes rather than looking for +1s. (Damage isn't great by thief standards - I win the occasional 1v1, and even the odd 1v2 versus bad or overconfident players, but usually by outlasting the enemy... a ganker it is not. And that's running Demolisher...)

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@draxynnic.3719 said:

@"Sir Vincent III.1286" said:But to answer the "simple question" above; If I would build it, it will look like this -
focusing on evasion, initiative gain, and 100% boon duration. Enjoy.

Pretty close to a build I run (which was based on the build in the video I posted), especially before the last patch. Main difference is that I ran Shortbow instead of Sword/Dagger - partially because I've found that sword/dagger doesn't really work for me, partially because I like having a ranged option, partially because it allows the option of stealth stacking using Smoke Screen, and primarily because the build is still oriented towards capping uncontested nodes, it's just that its other domain is holding those nodes rather than looking for +1s. (Damage isn't great by thief standards - I win the occasional 1v1, and even the odd 1v2 versus bad or overconfident players, but usually by outlasting the enemy... a ganker it is not. And that's running Demolisher...)

That video is old though. I can tell by just looking at the DD traits -- weakening and escapist no longer exist. :/

Also looking at that build with 11k health makes me skeptic of its survivability.

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Yeah, it was made a little before that patch. The principles still hold, though.

The low health is survivable through having higher Toughness, good condi clear, and regular healing (the benefit of relying on Toughness instead of Vitality is that it amplifies the effect of healing). It can be susceptible to being spiked, though.

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@draxynnic.3719 said:Yeah, it was made a little before that patch. The principles still hold, though.

The low health is survivable through having higher Toughness, good condi clear, and regular healing (the benefit of relying on Toughness instead of Vitality is that it amplifies the effect of healing). It can be susceptible to being spiked, though.

Well, Poison bypasses toughness and it reduced healing efficiency. In other words, the build will fail against any profession that applies poison. This is why Vitality is better than toughness in most cases.

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@Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Yeah, it was made a little before that patch. The principles still hold, though.

The low health is survivable through having higher Toughness, good condi clear, and regular healing (the benefit of relying on Toughness instead of Vitality is that it amplifies the effect of healing). It can be susceptible to being spiked, though.

Well, Poison bypasses toughness and it reduced healing efficiency. In other words, the build will fail against any profession that applies poison. This is why Vitality is better than toughness in most cases.

This depends on the amount of healing and the number of different sources. Even with Poison applied against you, if in a build that has multiple and ongoing heal sources toughness pulls ahead.

As example I have a shout warrior who heals 2500~ per shout plus heals on stun breaks ETC. He is much btter off in Higher toughness lower vitality. My Condition thief in Shamans mix of armor is much the same. If healing sources are limited to one or two with a significant down time between them than more vitality needed.

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@babazhook.6805 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Yeah, it was made a little before that patch. The principles still hold, though.

The low health is survivable through having higher Toughness, good condi clear, and regular healing (the benefit of relying on Toughness instead of Vitality is that it amplifies the effect of healing). It can be susceptible to being spiked, though.

Well, Poison bypasses toughness and it reduced healing efficiency. In other words, the build will fail against any profession that applies poison. This is why Vitality is better than toughness in most cases.

This depends on the amount of healing and the number of different sources. Even with Poison applied against you, if in a build that has multiple and ongoing heal sources toughness pulls ahead.

As example I have a shout warrior who heals 2500~ per shout plus heals on stun breaks ETC. He is much btter off in Higher toughness lower vitality. My Condition thief in Shamans mix of armor is much the same. If healing sources are limited to one or two with a significant down time between them than more vitality needed.

It also depends on how much condi cleanse you have. Poison (and condition damage in general) doesn't do much if you throw it off, and you can get a LOT of condi cleanse out of the build.

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just make a new thief go pvp lobby go dual dagger with daredevil acrobatics+random tree and alternate death blossom and lotus training, with a little training of near perfect chaining you basically are immortal, thou even with full condi build you wont deal that much damage, but thats irrelevant for this dicussion.

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@HyperLooser.2698 said:just make a new thief go pvp lobby go dual dagger with daredevil acrobatics+random tree and alternate death blossom and lotus training, with a little training of near perfect chaining you basically are immortal, thou even with full condi build you wont deal that much damage, but thats irrelevant for this dicussion.

Lmao death blossom chaining with lotus training for immortality? If fighting potatoes this just may work, any decent player will punish u hard if tried lolI apologize if this was a joke troll post and if so disregard my post.

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@babazhook.6805 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Yeah, it was made a little before that patch. The principles still hold, though.

The low health is survivable through having higher Toughness, good condi clear, and regular healing (the benefit of relying on Toughness instead of Vitality is that it amplifies the effect of healing). It can be susceptible to being spiked, though.

Well, Poison bypasses toughness and it reduced healing efficiency. In other words, the build will fail against any profession that applies poison. This is why Vitality is better than toughness in most cases.

This depends on the amount of healing and the number of different sources. Even with Poison applied against you, if in a build that has multiple and ongoing heal sources toughness pulls ahead.

As example I have a shout warrior who heals 2500~ per shout plus heals on stun breaks ETC. He is much btter off in Higher toughness lower vitality. My Condition thief in Shamans mix of armor is much the same. If healing sources are limited to one or two with a significant down time between them than more vitality needed.

I know for a fact the you make good builds. I've even adopted some of your build. However, the build in question has ZERO healing power and 11k HP using Earth Runes and Demo amulet. So I don't think that build concept applies here.

So in this case, if you decided to have ZERO healing power, you should at least invest in Vitality. Which is my point.

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@draxynnic.3719 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Yeah, it was made a little before that patch. The principles still hold, though.

The low health is survivable through having higher Toughness, good condi clear, and regular healing (the benefit of relying on Toughness instead of Vitality is that it amplifies the effect of healing). It can be susceptible to being spiked, though.

Well, Poison bypasses toughness and it reduced healing efficiency. In other words, the build will fail against any profession that applies poison. This is why Vitality is better than toughness in most cases.

This depends on the amount of healing and the number of different sources. Even with Poison applied against you, if in a build that has multiple and ongoing heal sources toughness pulls ahead.

As example I have a shout warrior who heals 2500~ per shout plus heals on stun breaks ETC. He is much btter off in Higher toughness lower vitality. My Condition thief in Shamans mix of armor is much the same. If healing sources are limited to one or two with a significant down time between them than more vitality needed.

It also depends on how much condi cleanse you have. Poison (and condition damage in general) doesn't do much if you throw it off, and you can get a LOT of condi cleanse out of the build.

Condi cleanse means nothing if you cannot top off the damage done. Plus, poison, bleeding, and torment are handed out like candies in the Thief shop. You cannot cleanse them all. If you look at @babazhook.6805's condition build, I doubt you'll last long against him.

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@Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Yeah, it was made a little before that patch. The principles still hold, though.

The low health is survivable through having higher Toughness, good condi clear, and regular healing (the benefit of relying on Toughness instead of Vitality is that it amplifies the effect of healing). It can be susceptible to being spiked, though.

Well, Poison bypasses toughness and it reduced healing efficiency. In other words, the build will fail against any profession that applies poison. This is why Vitality is better than toughness in most cases.

This depends on the amount of healing and the number of different sources. Even with Poison applied against you, if in a build that has multiple and ongoing heal sources toughness pulls ahead.

As example I have a shout warrior who heals 2500~ per shout plus heals on stun breaks ETC. He is much btter off in Higher toughness lower vitality. My Condition thief in Shamans mix of armor is much the same. If healing sources are limited to one or two with a significant down time between them than more vitality needed.

I know for a fact the you make good builds. I've even adopted some of your build. However, the build in question has ZERO healing power and 11k HP using Earth Runes and Demo amulet. So I don't think that build concept applies here.

So in this case, if you decided to have ZERO healing power, you should at least invest in Vitality. Which is my point.

Yes, I was not speaking to the build in question. I was just pointing out that dependent on the build toughness is advantageous over vitality . I was giving examples of where you better off with toughness.

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@babazhook.6805 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Yeah, it was made a little before that patch. The principles still hold, though.

The low health is survivable through having higher Toughness, good condi clear, and regular healing (the benefit of relying on Toughness instead of Vitality is that it amplifies the effect of healing). It can be susceptible to being spiked, though.

Well, Poison bypasses toughness and it reduced healing efficiency. In other words, the build will fail against any profession that applies poison. This is why Vitality is better than toughness in most cases.

This depends on the amount of healing and the number of different sources. Even with Poison applied against you, if in a build that has multiple and ongoing heal sources toughness pulls ahead.

As example I have a shout warrior who heals 2500~ per shout plus heals on stun breaks ETC. He is much btter off in Higher toughness lower vitality. My Condition thief in Shamans mix of armor is much the same. If healing sources are limited to one or two with a significant down time between them than more vitality needed.

I know for a fact the you make good builds. I've even adopted some of your build. However, the build in question has ZERO healing power and 11k HP using Earth Runes and Demo amulet. So I don't think that build concept applies here.

So in this case, if you decided to have ZERO healing power, you should at least invest in Vitality. Which is my point.

Yes, I was not speaking to the build in question. I was just pointing out that dependent on the build toughness is advantageous over vitality . I was giving examples of where you better off with toughness.

I agree. But the main topic is about high evasion uptime and my position is within that context.

So if you're evading attacks, you wouldn't really need Toughness since the idea is not to get hit. In this situation, Vitality is essential since condition damage cannot be evaded. You can evade the application of the condition, but once you get hit, Toughness will do nothing for you. At the very least, Vitality will buy you enough time to wait for your cleanse cooldown, endurance to refill, or initiative to regen.

The build I posted above grants high Vitality and 100% buff duration. With High Vitality and effectively endless health regen and vigor, the build can take damage (thanks to marauder's resilience and weakening strike) and will simply heal back up in no time -- while also dealing good damage (bound boost, weakening strikes, and staff mastery).

I just don't see how the build in the video can survive at all. It deals a lot of damage, but I really doubt its survival.

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@Sir Vincent III.1286 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Yeah, it was made a little before that patch. The principles still hold, though.

The low health is survivable through having higher Toughness, good condi clear, and regular healing (the benefit of relying on Toughness instead of Vitality is that it amplifies the effect of healing). It can be susceptible to being spiked, though.

Well, Poison bypasses toughness and it reduced healing efficiency. In other words, the build will fail against any profession that applies poison. This is why Vitality is better than toughness in most cases.

This depends on the amount of healing and the number of different sources. Even with Poison applied against you, if in a build that has multiple and ongoing heal sources toughness pulls ahead.

As example I have a shout warrior who heals 2500~ per shout plus heals on stun breaks ETC. He is much btter off in Higher toughness lower vitality. My Condition thief in Shamans mix of armor is much the same. If healing sources are limited to one or two with a significant down time between them than more vitality needed.

I know for a fact the you make good builds. I've even adopted some of your build. However, the build in question has ZERO healing power and 11k HP using Earth Runes and Demo amulet. So I don't think that build concept applies here.

So in this case, if you decided to have ZERO healing power, you should at least invest in Vitality. Which is my point.

Yes, I was not speaking to the build in question. I was just pointing out that dependent on the build toughness is advantageous over vitality . I was giving examples of where you better off with toughness.

I agree. But the main topic is about high evasion uptime and my position is within that context.

So if you're evading attacks, you wouldn't really need Toughness since the idea is not to get hit. In this situation, Vitality is essential since condition damage cannot be evaded. You can evade the application of the condition, but once you get hit, Toughness will do nothing for you. At the very least, Vitality will buy you enough time to wait for your cleanse cooldown, endurance to refill, or initiative to regen.

The build I posted above grants high Vitality and 100% buff duration. With High Vitality and effectively endless health regen and vigor, the build can take damage (thanks to marauder's resilience and weakening strike) and will simply heal back up in no time -- while also dealing good damage (bound boost, weakening strikes, and staff mastery).

I just don't see how the build in the video can survive at all. It deals a lot of damage, but I really doubt its survival.

In a low Vitality + healing build build the key is the Acro line. With that healing you take Pain Response , GI and Assassins reward. You slap on Anti-toxin rune. You will have next to no issues with Conditions as the GI , PR and Escapist combination can keep them all off you. GI is very effective with anti-toxin runes in a build where you can keep your percentage of health over the threshold and this easier done with a lower vitality build. Given assassins reward a static heal and you get a heal on evade via the DRD line the health will usually be over 75 percent poison or not and GI flushes one condition every attack+1 from Anti-toxin and you get the 1+1 off the Escapists .

I am not sure in anti-toxin available in pvp.

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@babazhook.6805 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Yeah, it was made a little before that patch. The principles still hold, though.

The low health is survivable through having higher Toughness, good condi clear, and regular healing (the benefit of relying on Toughness instead of Vitality is that it amplifies the effect of healing). It can be susceptible to being spiked, though.

Well, Poison bypasses toughness and it reduced healing efficiency. In other words, the build will fail against any profession that applies poison. This is why Vitality is better than toughness in most cases.

This depends on the amount of healing and the number of different sources. Even with Poison applied against you, if in a build that has multiple and ongoing heal sources toughness pulls ahead.

As example I have a shout warrior who heals 2500~ per shout plus heals on stun breaks ETC. He is much btter off in Higher toughness lower vitality. My Condition thief in Shamans mix of armor is much the same. If healing sources are limited to one or two with a significant down time between them than more vitality needed.

I know for a fact the you make good builds. I've even adopted some of your build. However, the build in question has ZERO healing power and 11k HP using Earth Runes and Demo amulet. So I don't think that build concept applies here.

So in this case, if you decided to have ZERO healing power, you should at least invest in Vitality. Which is my point.

Yes, I was not speaking to the build in question. I was just pointing out that dependent on the build toughness is advantageous over vitality . I was giving examples of where you better off with toughness.

I agree. But the main topic is about high evasion uptime and my position is within that context.

So if you're evading attacks, you wouldn't really need Toughness since the idea is not to get hit. In this situation, Vitality is essential since condition damage cannot be evaded. You can evade the application of the condition, but once you get hit, Toughness will do nothing for you. At the very least, Vitality will buy you enough time to wait for your cleanse cooldown, endurance to refill, or initiative to regen.

The build I posted above grants high Vitality and 100% buff duration. With High Vitality and effectively endless health regen and vigor, the build can take damage (thanks to marauder's resilience and weakening strike) and will simply heal back up in no time -- while also dealing good damage (bound boost, weakening strikes, and staff mastery).

I just don't see how the build in the video can survive at all. It deals a lot of damage, but I really doubt its survival.

In a low Vitality + healing build build the key is the Acro line. With that healing you take Pain Response , GI and Assassins reward. You slap on Anti-toxin rune. You will have next to no issues with Conditions as the GI , PR and Escapist combination can keep them all off you. GI is very effective with anti-toxin runes in a build where you can keep your percentage of health over the threshold and this easier done with a lower vitality build. Given assassins reward a static heal and you get a heal on evade via the DRD line the health will usually be over 75 percent poison or not and GI flushes one condition every attack+1 from Anti-toxin and you get the 1+1 off the Escapists .

I am not sure in anti-toxin available in pvp.

Yeah no anti-toxin in PvP.

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@babazhook.6805 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Yeah, it was made a little before that patch. The principles still hold, though.

The low health is survivable through having higher Toughness, good condi clear, and regular healing (the benefit of relying on Toughness instead of Vitality is that it amplifies the effect of healing). It can be susceptible to being spiked, though.

Well, Poison bypasses toughness and it reduced healing efficiency. In other words, the build will fail against any profession that applies poison. This is why Vitality is better than toughness in most cases.

This depends on the amount of healing and the number of different sources. Even with Poison applied against you, if in a build that has multiple and ongoing heal sources toughness pulls ahead.

As example I have a shout warrior who heals 2500~ per shout plus heals on stun breaks ETC. He is much btter off in Higher toughness lower vitality. My Condition thief in Shamans mix of armor is much the same. If healing sources are limited to one or two with a significant down time between them than more vitality needed.

I know for a fact the you make good builds. I've even adopted some of your build. However, the build in question has ZERO healing power and 11k HP using Earth Runes and Demo amulet. So I don't think that build concept applies here.

So in this case, if you decided to have ZERO healing power, you should at least invest in Vitality. Which is my point.

Yes, I was not speaking to the build in question. I was just pointing out that dependent on the build toughness is advantageous over vitality . I was giving examples of where you better off with toughness.

I agree. But the main topic is about high evasion uptime and my position is within that context.

So if you're evading attacks, you wouldn't really need Toughness since the idea is not to get hit. In this situation, Vitality is essential since condition damage cannot be evaded. You can evade the application of the condition, but once you get hit, Toughness will do nothing for you. At the very least, Vitality will buy you enough time to wait for your cleanse cooldown, endurance to refill, or initiative to regen.

The build I posted above grants high Vitality and 100% buff duration. With High Vitality and effectively endless health regen and vigor, the build can take damage (thanks to marauder's resilience and weakening strike) and will simply heal back up in no time -- while also dealing good damage (bound boost, weakening strikes, and staff mastery).

I just don't see how the build in the video can survive at all. It deals a lot of damage, but I really doubt its survival.

In a low Vitality + healing build build the key is the Acro line. With that healing you take Pain Response , GI and Assassins reward. You slap on Anti-toxin rune. You will have next to no issues with Conditions as the GI , PR and Escapist combination can keep them all off you. GI is very effective with anti-toxin runes in a build where you can keep your percentage of health over the threshold and this easier done with a lower vitality build. Given assassins reward a static heal and you get a heal on evade via the DRD line the health will usually be over 75 percent poison or not and GI flushes one condition every attack+1 from Anti-toxin and you get the 1+1 off the Escapists .

I am not sure in anti-toxin available in pvp.

Close. Escapist's Fortitude cleanses a condition when you evade an attack, and Trickster cleanses a condition when you use a trick. Combining with Roll for Initiative or Withdraw mean you can shake off a lot of conditions quickly. Signet of Agility is also a condi cleanse, and condi-cleansing sigils can also be used.

Conditions really aren't a major problem unless you get hit with a big stack of burning from the fire weaver build and don't cleanse in time. If there's one of those around, then it's probably worth going for the extra Vitality. Generally speaking, though, when playing the build I'm more worried about CC chains and well-timed power spikes than conditions.

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@draxynnic.3719 said:

@draxynnic.3719 said:Yeah, it was made a little before that patch. The principles still hold, though.

The low health is survivable through having higher Toughness, good condi clear, and regular healing (the benefit of relying on Toughness instead of Vitality is that it amplifies the effect of healing). It can be susceptible to being spiked, though.

Well, Poison bypasses toughness and it reduced healing efficiency. In other words, the build will fail against any profession that applies poison. This is why Vitality is better than toughness in most cases.

This depends on the amount of healing and the number of different sources. Even with Poison applied against you, if in a build that has multiple and ongoing heal sources toughness pulls ahead.

As example I have a shout warrior who heals 2500~ per shout plus heals on stun breaks ETC. He is much btter off in Higher toughness lower vitality. My Condition thief in Shamans mix of armor is much the same. If healing sources are limited to one or two with a significant down time between them than more vitality needed.

I know for a fact the you make good builds. I've even adopted some of your build. However, the build in question has ZERO healing power and 11k HP using Earth Runes and Demo amulet. So I don't think that build concept applies here.

So in this case, if you decided to have ZERO healing power, you should at least invest in Vitality. Which is my point.

Yes, I was not speaking to the build in question. I was just pointing out that dependent on the build toughness is advantageous over vitality . I was giving examples of where you better off with toughness.

I agree. But the main topic is about high evasion uptime and my position is within that context.

So if you're evading attacks, you wouldn't really need Toughness since the idea is not to get hit. In this situation, Vitality is essential since condition damage cannot be evaded. You can evade the application of the condition, but once you get hit, Toughness will do nothing for you. At the very least, Vitality will buy you enough time to wait for your cleanse cooldown, endurance to refill, or initiative to regen.

The build I posted above grants high Vitality and 100% buff duration. With High Vitality and effectively endless health regen and vigor, the build can take damage (thanks to marauder's resilience and weakening strike) and will simply heal back up in no time -- while also dealing good damage (bound boost, weakening strikes, and staff mastery).

I just don't see how the build in the video can survive at all. It deals a lot of damage, but I really doubt its survival.

In a low Vitality + healing build build the key is the Acro line. With that healing you take Pain Response , GI and Assassins reward. You slap on Anti-toxin rune. You will have next to no issues with Conditions as the GI , PR and Escapist combination can keep them all off you. GI is very effective with anti-toxin runes in a build where you can keep your percentage of health over the threshold and this easier done with a lower vitality build. Given assassins reward a static heal and you get a heal on evade via the DRD line the health will usually be over 75 percent poison or not and GI flushes one condition every attack+1 from Anti-toxin and you get the 1+1 off the Escapists .

I am not sure in anti-toxin available in pvp.

Close. Escapist's Fortitude cleanses a condition when you evade an attack, and Trickster cleanses a condition when you use a trick. Combining with Roll for Initiative or Withdraw mean you can shake off a lot of conditions quickly. Signet of Agility is also a condi cleanse, and condi-cleansing sigils can also be used.

That's true, however with ZERO healing power, you won't be able to top-off the damage you've taken. Withdraw will not be very effective either with ZERO healing power. Low Vitality build relies on high healing power to refill lost health.

Conditions really aren't a major problem unless you get hit with a big stack of burning from the fire weaver build and don't cleanse in time. If there's one of those around, then it's probably worth going for the extra Vitality. Generally speaking, though, when playing the build I'm more worried about CC chains and well-timed power spikes than conditions.

Even if you endured a power spike, with ZERO healing power, you will be forced to disengage, hide, and wait for your health to regen, else you'd die. Assassin's Reward heals poorly with ZERO healing power also so that is not very reliable source of healing if you want to keep your opponent occupied. Which means, you will not last long in the node to keep the fight going for "6 minutes" or so.

Remember that idea is to keep a high evasion uptime, meaning a lot of Vigor and endurance refill, and keep the fight to last up to 6 minutes without giving up the node. You won't accomplish this with low HP, low concentration, and ZERO healing power.

Your build is effective in hit, spike, and run, but not for dancing on the node.

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My experience says otherwise.

With zero healing power, Escapist's Fortitude heals for over 400 with a 1s ICD, which is a respectable amount. Assassin's Reward is ~400-500 per skill for as long as you keep initiative up, and the build has a decent initiative engine Traited Withdraw is close to 5000 on a cooldown of less than fifteen seconds, giving you a total of around 700 health/second plus whatever you get out of Assassin's Reward. This is actually pretty good when the enemy is having trouble hitting you at all and they're dealing reduced damage because you have Toughness.

Vitality is better for defending against being spiked down (and being spiked in a vulnerable frame IS a weakness of the build), but it isn't as good for sustaining long-term in fights where you do manage to avoid those spikes. Even without healing power, the damage reduction from Toughness increases the effective value of your heals (and your condition removal will deal with most condition pressure). if you went for Vitality instead, you'd be more resistant to spikes, but you'd be more prone to being worn down over time as your heals count for less.

Obviously, if you ran Paladin or something that combines toughness and healing power (which means Celestial, since everything else that combined those two stats got removed for being too tanky - funny that!) you'd probably be even tougher, but you'd also hit like a wet noodle. Even in something like Marauder or Demolisher, a weakness of the build is that it pays for its sustain through not having a lot of kill potential, so going to a more defence-oriented amulet starts entering wet noodle territory.

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@draxynnic.3719 said:My experience says otherwise.

With zero healing power, Escapist's Fortitude heals for over 400 with a 1s ICD, which is a respectable amount. Assassin's Reward is ~400-500 per skill for as long as you keep initiative up, and the build has a decent initiative engine Traited Withdraw is close to 5000 on a cooldown of less than fifteen seconds, giving you a total of around 700 health/second plus whatever you get out of Assassin's Reward. This is actually pretty good when the enemy is having trouble hitting you at all and they're dealing reduced damage because you have Toughness.

The heal-per-initiative-spent return from A.Reward is really poor with ZERO healing power. It is also an unreliable source of health if you have Confusion and Poison on you. The only real reliable source of healing is Withdraw and even traited will not be enough alleviate the condition pressure. Just as @babazhook.6805 said, which I agree, that high Toughness only works if you can outperform the damage and the reduced healing efficiency by having tons of healing power. Without it, you'll be easily pressured out of the node. Which is a failure to succeed on the objective of staying on the node for "6 minutes".

Vitality is better for defending against being spiked down (and being spiked in a vulnerable frame IS a weakness of the build), but it isn't as good for sustaining long-term in fights where you do manage to avoid those spikes. Even without healing power, the damage reduction from Toughness increases the effective value of your heals (and your condition removal will deal with most condition pressure). if you went for Vitality instead, you'd be more resistant to spikes, but you'd be more prone to being worn down over time as your heals count for less.

High Vitality, High Healing Power, and 100% buff duration shrugs off spikes and condition damage. With a 100% buff duration and high healing power, you can keep Health Regen healing for a very long time at high potency. Thus, it gives longevity to the build, meaning the build is not prone to being worn down over time.

Obviously, if you ran Paladin or something that combines toughness and healing power (which means Celestial, since everything else that combined those two stats got removed for being too tanky - funny that!) you'd probably be even tougher, but you'd also hit like a wet noodle. Even in something like Marauder or Demolisher, a weakness of the build is that it pays for its sustain through not having a lot of kill potential, so going to a more defence-oriented amulet starts entering wet noodle territory.

Yeah, Paladin is no good. The new Harrier ammy with Radiance rune is the key here.

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Again, you're trying to beat my experience with theorycraft.

There IS no amulet currently available in sPvP that has both Toughness and Healing Power except Celestial, and that's just not going to hit hard enough to do anything but pure survival.

The build works because it's not just relying on Toughness. It's relying on rarely getting hit in the first place, and Toughness (along with Weakness spam) reduces the damage of the hits you DO take so that the healing you get can keep pace, even at base healing. Going Vitality instead provides protection against spikes, but reduces the value of your healing over time since the gain in "effective health" of each heal is less.

I fully agree that being able to combine Toughness and Healing Power would synergise well - but the decision of the ArenaNet balance team is clearly that it synergises too well to be available outside of Celestial, and Celestial sacrifices a lot of your damage stats. The way I usually play the build, Demolisher is really the lowest damage I can afford to have and still be able to achieve anything other than not dying.

Clearly, though, this argument is going around in circles. You're obviously sticking your heels in, and I can tell you that you're not going to persuade me that the build doesn't work when my own experience is that, within the limitations of my latency and skill level, it does. So I think this discussion is well past the point where it could be considered productive to continue.

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Wow, salty people all around here.

I played a super evasive condi d/d trickery/acro/daredevil build for a while for fun, where the combination of Death Blossom and Lotus Training dodges would give me lots of "damage while evading" although I had to sacrifice too much damage so it was basically almost a troll build.

With the Trickster trait that reduces trick cooldowns, you can use Withdraw every ~14 seconds. With Vigorous Recovery from acro which gives you vigor on heal and Endless Stamina which increases vigor effectiveness, that means you not only evade via the Withdraw itself but also start regenerating lots of endurance right after it, allowing you to start dodging again pretty soon. Also don't forget the Steal with reduced cooldown (24s) which also gives you back 25% endurance.

You can also cast Roll for Initiative every 32 seconds which evades and gives lots of ini to allow you to keep up Death Blossom. Combine that with Upper Hand from acro which gives ini on evade every 2s, and you have a high Death Blossom uptime.

Then there's Instant Reflexes which can kick in every 40s, and Dagger Storm whose cooldown is reduced to 72s thanks to Trickster.

Oh and Hard to Catch from acro which can kick in every 30s and COMPLETELY REFILLS endurance when someone tries to CC you. Yeah.

I didn't even use sigils of energy on that build and it was already ridiculously evasive. I can very much believe OP's 6 minute story. It might have been a troll build made explicitly for that exact purpose.

EDIT: There's more to it that I forgot, LOL.

Traited Haste has a 24s cooldown and breaks stun. The 32s cd Roll for Initiative is also a stun break. Traited Bandit's Defense (via Brawler's Tenacity) has a 16s cooldown, breaks stun, blocks, and refills 10% of your endurance. So while your Hard to Catch is on its 30s cooldown you still have THREE stun breaks with 16s, 24s, and 32s cooldown, where the one with the shortest cd also blocks and refills a bit of endurance.

Do not underestimate a good troll thief's absurd survivability. :D

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Not salty so much as annoyed when someone tries to levy theorycraft against experience. I've tried running Marauder's instead of Demolisher's - the long-term sustain drops, while the increased resistance against spikes is negligible. The main weakness in my experience is getting stunlocked and power spiked, and at best Marauder gives you another second for a stunbreak to come up.

When it comes to the healing power vs toughness argument... I was curious, so I looked at the numbers:

An increase in Toughness of 560 gives you an effective increase in health of 25%. This doesn't apply to conditions, and when added to the smaller starting health pool of the thief it's less than the 5600 you'd get from Vitality, but this also means that the effective increase in any healing you receive is increased by 25% against power damage.

Conversely, the healing power coefficient of Withdraw and Escapist's Fortitude is pretty low - 560 HP only gets you about 10% increase in healing received. Assassin's Reward is more sensitive to healing power, getting you about a 50% boost over the low base value, but if we're assuming that Assassin's Reward is less than half of the total, which seems reasonable (Initiative naturally replenishes at one per second, and if you include other sources of Initiative, you can probably double that at most, putting the return from Assassin's Reward at around 200-300 per second sustained) you actually get more value from your healing by investing into toughness than healing power (since the build is already fairly strong against conditions and isn't concerned about healing others).

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