What the best all-around build for Thief?

[Patkus.9178]

I see staff DD being used mainly in PvE (it sucks in PvP or WvW roaming cuz it's kinda a slow weapon that a good player can play around), d/d DE seems nice but again is kinda meh in PvP or WvW as you have even less mobility than core Thief and core Thief seems to not work in PvE anymore cuz it's being overshadowed by both specs. Sure it might work in Open World but Raids and Fractals seem to be a no go.

Is there even such a thing as a good all-around build?

[foste.3098]

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAsaVn8lClOhFOBGmC0PhFsiqLAiuCwLDugOYO6v+tH-jpxHQBXrMA8eAA9Y/BldEAI4JAAAHCAA for spvphttp://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAsaVn8lClOhFOBGmC0PhFsiqLAiuCwLDugOYO6v+tH-j1CEQBXUpFAOEANRJS2OCAuTfABeAAMZ/hApE0hKD8n6PA8EAEAAB4mtZbezAH9oH9oH9o1m38m38m38oH9m3sUArOGA-w for wvw

Reached plat 2 with it (before tanking to plat 1 near season end by messing around with chronomancer). The build has everything you want for spvp and wvw: damage, mobility, cc, stealth, a 'safety switch' so you do not instantly die if you make a mistake.Bear in mind that pistol whip has evade frames during the sword flurry, which is fact anet has not put on the skill tooltip after 7 years.

[kaikalii.4198]

@"foste.3098" said:snip

While I do love S/P and have used it a lot to great success, lately, I have been using the standard S/D and getting better results. That's a link to the conquest build, but it is essentially the same for PvP and WvW. I find it has a little more sustain than S/P, and it isn't dependant on a single burst. You just do consistent damage wile consistently avoiding it. The only downside is that it takes a little longer to learn it enough to become effective.

[foste.3098]

@kaikalii.4198 said:dependant on a single burst

But s/p is nowhere near dependent on a single burst, most of your damage comes from the following combo: black powder > dodge for stealth (ideally landing on the opponent) > tactical strike > aa chain. Only inexperienced players rely on pistol whip as their main/only way to deal damage.

From my experience s/p has a much better chance against engineers, rangers, and necros and is worst against other thieves (i mainly use short bow for them and swap to the main set to burst after they blow most of their initiative trying to land flanking strikes / shadow shots) and about the same vs everything else. The main advantage of the meta battle build is access to poison on steal, but other than that i can find no appeal (other than the play style which is fun) to run it.