DrakoBlade.1759

This is kind of funny looking at this Thread after the Thief Teaser, I think a lot of the Comments here early on in the thread sort of hit on different parts of what is seen lmao...

If we were to just run with your idea, something like this shadow form could potentially be an interesting twist. It would create an interesting support for sure, possibly too strong though depending on what they do with the Elite Spec tied to it. I see what you mean though, we might not need more smoke fields lol. Although, if you look at Ranger with Poison, Revenant with Dark, and Mesmer with Ethereal, I wouldn't mind like 1 or 2 more Smoke Fields on Thief. As far as the stealth thing, they could just remove the stealth 1 while in shadow form and change to an upgraded 3(similar to the malice stealth attack). If they did something like this though, they would probably have to give us an f2 tied to the initiative, the con to this though is that it might make make it too similar to a Necro. To differentiate, you would have to have a very different type of utility than spectral, and instead more like the whole Glamour skills, Spirits(from Ranger), or Consecrations. They would also have to be careful not to change the class too much, which is why initiative, the steal, the 3 skill, and such would need to be evolution(and not completely something else) or intact(in the case of the steal), as they risk this too much if they do. Plus another way to differentiate would be the cosmetic effects, it might have to be that redish/black color of a lot of the Deadeye's kit. In fact, I even came up with a similar idea apparently 3yrs ago, I went back into an old post I made, and this who shadow form thing happened to be inside it. I just happen to see it just now, looking through my own old posts xD. You and myself from 3 yrs ago might agree on a ton of things about this topic...

Yeah, I was mostly bringing it up in the type of support this elite spec could bring if it had supporty elements, just so it doesn't step on the toes of other supports in gw2. Also the thing to keep in mind about the whole FFXIV environment, their supports are a lot more like our's where yes they give help to the team, but they also are meant to deal a ton of damage as well, every class is at least a damage class secondary(if not primary). That is besides the point though, as the type of support Scholar typically does is the whole mitigation of damage, rather than helping people sustain and recover. Best way to explain it in gw2 terms, it's if a a Support were to continually focus on giving blocking, stability, resistance, evasion, blinds, aegis, and the like. This is good and all, but I think if we want some kind of arcane trickster, then the Glamour skills could actually be awesome here. Mesmer also borrowed from the Thief with Mirage, this could be a chance for Thief to borrow from them. While if you are wanting something more combo related, then the whole initiative idea before could also be a thing and Spectral skills from Necro could be a nice touch. Due to how Spectral Skills work, it could directly interact with some evolution of the Initiative Bar, and allow for more use of the weapon skills in some way, similar to how Rage skills extend berserker state for Warrior. While the Spirits, Consecrations, and Wells I mentioned before being mostly other ways one could get out boons and/or condition damage in a broader sense, that was my thoughts before anyway.

Idk why, but I completely skipped over this comment as I was looking back through it, and I want to touch on it too. I had actually thought about Greatsword awhile ago, you might even be able to see it in my old history on the forums. While they might give thieves another two-handed again, based on track record, I have since changed my mind and thought some kind of one handed weapon would be better for the thief, so it can take advantage of the Dual Skill(3 Slot). Outside of that, the whole AOE, Combo Fields, and high damage then this could still be done if the thing we get acts in a mage-like way, no matter the actual weapon they use to achieve it. In fact, I would find it funny if they use a weapon that's typically a martial one, to make a mage weapon(like Axe on Necro or Daggers on Ele for example), since they did the same with Staff but reversed in HoT's. And, the AOE could be something that applies conditions like Plaguelands on Necro(effectively fulfilling that need in a thief).

Thinking about it I actually see two problems with Thieves picking up stances, the first I sort of already mentioned with the whole Thieves already have physical skills, so to take from Warrior again just doesn't make sense. The other though, is actually because of just how many classes got stances, we got the Elementalist and Ranger both in the last xpac. I don't know if your talking overloads or shouts, for the Tempest because the Weaver is the one with it, but that is besides the point. We also have venoms too, so that is technically a third reason I guess, as they do work to some extent similar to stances albeit slightly different, as it's more an on-hit proc than a purely passive bonus for the duration. For about 90% of this I do agree, the other 10% is mostly about the fact that they tend to get really creative with their weapon implementation, look no further than Rev Hammer, Ele Daggers, Daredevil and Rev Bo Staff(instead of mage staff), and Mesmer Greatsword. But, I see what you mean, since due to Swindler's Equilibrium in the Acrobatics Specialization, they would to some extent have to be some kind of Power/Evasion weapon(in offhand), unless they rework that trait. I really want to see them do something with it as well, especially when looking at how they did it with Weaver. If they went with some kind of bruiser though, there would need to be one big thing there, more vitality scaling or just sustain in general. If they did this, plus the evasion thats already in the base thief's kit, the Bunker meta would resurface in PvP(if it even went away while I was gone from the game, and I haven't gone back into PvP much yet) instead of Chronos in HoTs or early Scourge in PoF, it would be the Thief. I am just not sure they want to repeat this weakness again. Which would be interesting if my previous thoughts end up coming to be, because if we get some kind of "shield" support like say Scholar from FFXIV, with the gw2 landscape I could see someone attempt to make a tank build out of that.

I have recently looked at the classes as a whole in a different light, as I took a break from the game and only recently returned a couple months ago really. Thief was my main, and I am still enjoying thief and with the "new" build system they have a am setting up a second build for thief as well. So, lets first get into what I think the thief needs in a new specialization, and then get into the different potentials they could run with it. So first of all, similar to a Warrior and an Elementalist, the class mechanics and the general idea revolves around the weapon skills. What I mean by this is for the Elementalist, the class mechanic is simply there to bring more depth to the weapon skills, with some exceptions in the utilities and well Warrior is self explanatory in this as well. For thief, it's the same between how initiative works, the 3 skill, how simple the f1 is, and how invis gives Thiefs a different 1 skill thief is very much a weapon class. One of the more unique mechanics thief's hold(at least in flavor text) is the ability to shadow step, which that in addition to other things leads to Thief's mobility. Thief by itself has very little natural sustain except for maybe some pseudo-lifesteal or selfish-condition cleanse, but these are so little that it's mostly to compensate for them being one of the lowest base health. This all explains why Daredevil was actually a really good elite Spec for thief, they doubled down on the mobility side of the class, and brought in more ways they can cc their foes, effectively increasing their comparable mobility to those said foes as well. All the main ways thieves find defense, the Daredevil just amplifies. Deadeye is also another really good elite spec, because it further specialized the thief into the stealth aspects(with the full malice 1 skill), and the raw damage from the boon production in via the utilization of their f1 ability, and bringing more depth to that. Obviously with no question, you can build either Daredevil or Deadeye in ways outside of damage "support"(not by gw2 standards but other games, due to how they can increase the damage of their allies) and Evasion Tank. From a pure design perspective though, that is what Daredevil and Deadeye bring to the table. However, the weapons they give do not take advantage of the 3 skill or the initiative mechanic. This is a great opportunity for them to make the next elite spec to enhance those further, making it that the next weapon should be either a primary or an offhand. So the evolved class mechanic should revolve around the 3 skill in some way, and it should change or evolve the Initiative mechanic, while the weapon has to be either an Offhand or a Mainhand Weapon(or both like how spellbreaker got warrior 2 daggers). We do not need any utilities that increase their own mobility, due to having just in base thief Deception and Trick skills, but we also have acrobatics and daredevil specializations exist for the passives. They have in a way beaten the dead horse of mobility when it comes to thief. Plus if they go too far into the mobility side of thief, they could very well invalidate much of what Daredevil brings. Unfortunately, the same could also be said for the invisibility side of thief with deception and some preparation utilities, shadow arts and deadeye. So, what hasn't been touched on yet? Well the obvious answer is the venom skills as far as existing utilities are concerned, we have one base specialization that used to be what enhanced them, but that part of it was then put into the actual function of the utility itself, and Venom skills also deal with condition damage, life steal, and cc. So one could say that potentially, specialization wise for thief, if they repeat the same cycle as the last two specs, they could make a class that has things similar to either deadly arts or trickery(for the initiate stuff mentioned earlier). However utility wise, the Daredevil utilities and the Deadeye utilities borrow or "steal" from another class. If I were to propose possibilities, then I would say either Glamours from Mesmer, Consecration from Guardian, Spirits from Rangers, and Spectral(purely because of the whole initiative thing before) or Wells from Necromancers. The reason why I didn't add Warrior or Elementalist is that at this point in time I can't think of a precedent when one class took from the same class twice, which is why unlike other players I rule out Stances. However, one can tell sort of what I am thinking of already probably, a more Condi and/or Supportive shadow magic focused Thief. The biggest problem I see with this, is the potential conflict from the Scourge Necromancer though. Due to this last point, I think if it is a Condi *and* Supportive Spec, it would have to lean more into the condi and produce better support options than Deadeye, but not tread too much on Scourge's territory. Which is why *if* this is gonna produce any kind of defensive support, I do not think it will be from anything involving barriers. Rather it might be more from the mitigation of damage, like aegis, other forms of blocking, stability, resistance, evasion, blinds, and the like. For a new offensive boon they can produce, I like the idea of alacrity since they can already give themselves quickness from Deadeye. There is still the potential that for the first time on Thief, we get a whole new type of utility like Rage from Warrior, Exceed from Engineer, or Punishment from Necromancer. In this case though, this would get into more flimsy territory as it would be completely new and hard to figure out before hand how it might work, so I won't make any conclusions on that. But, this leads my final conclusion to be a Condi and/or Support Specialization, that has an evolved class mechanic revolving around the initiative mechanic and the 3 skill, using a Mainhand and/or Offhand weapon, and with some kind of AoE(probably ground target and/or around the player) or initiative related Utility(like Spectral). For combo fields I could see if it leans more into the supportive side, they could do either Dark, Light, or Smoke, while if they lean more into the Condition Damage side they could bring Dark, Poison, or Ethereal fields in from their utilities, either way I do see more Dark Fields coming out of this(but an alternative is maybe one light or smoke field and one poison or ethereal field). Let me know what anyone else thinks, and if you have any rebuttals or if you want to expand on my own thoughts.