[WTF has happened to thief?]

i have been maining thief for such a long time it was the first class i played when i got the game and i've been playing on and off for a long time but i feel like the class has just gotten more boring. Thief has always required some skill to play effectively (atleast in PvP) since its a squishy class by default but it felt really nice when you actually got rewarded for outplaying your opponent by blinding key skills and landing bursts and backstabs on people at crucial times but its just gotten boring since you dont really get that reward in the form of damage anymore other classes have just gotten tankier over time ever since the june 2015 balance patch that replaced traits with specializations before that there was a lot more build diversity and more options. Then they released HoT and that made almost every single class a lot stronger and their defences became better after that thief felt really weak atleast D/P you could still use something like staff but it was still a weak class just like warrior was back then. But then later on they buffed thief and increased AA damage on dagger that actually made thief feel a lot better when you actually did a lot of damage if people just let you hit them over. Thief was still very squishy and back then had no invulns exept dodges wich thief got in spades maybe to much especially if you were using dash so they nerfed it and added exaustion to it and thats fair enough its kinda OP to get out of every single movement impairing condi just with a dodge but it was ether before this or after this PoF launched and then they just increased condi damage overall and gave some specs ridiculus amounts of survuvability so thief started feeling a bit weaker but it was still fun to play exept when you got 1 shot by a condi bomb from a scourge. A bit after that i took a pretty long break on and off but more often off and now thief basically has no damage its back to where it was just after HoT dropped. Against any competent player you can only run and try to decap. overall thiefs low base health and pretty crappy damage makes it really boring to play combined with the game moving more and more towards condi and tankier builds and all these passive invulns and shit like that just slows the game down. (and thief has no good condi build) Sadly i've tried every class and most of them just feel boring compared to thief but all of them feel a lot stronger so im probably just gonna leave the game again and keep an eye out to see if they make some good changes.

[WTF has happened to thief?]

okay i played a couple of games with that build and i didnt like it was nice with all the interrupts but overall it deals less damage then my staff build does on avreage, it has worse teamfight pressence, less survivability especially against a condi build and worse mobility but it has a better single target focus and ofc all the interrupts gonna try some condi S/D build and see if it works

[WTF has happened to thief?]

@"foste.3098" said:http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAsaVn0MBlOhFOBGmC0PhlriqbAmuAwbDygPYO6z+uH-jpxHQBXrMgyOEAw7EAQwHAAAOCA9Y/BAThis is my main build with which i reached high plat. It has good synergy between traits and weapon skills, basing its damage on interruption and sustain on evasion; there is a stigma against pistol whip so expect lots of salt.The main way to do damage is by landing tactical strike (get stealth by dodging through black powder) and landing a full aa chain, while infiltrator's strike and head shot are used when it's opportune. Pistol whip is best used 'as a dodge', basically instead of dodging an obvious attack you whip it to interrupt it and do heavy damage (pistol whip has an evade frame during the sword flurry part but it is not listed on the tooltip).

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAoaVl0MhSnYhTwvJQ/EL0E2cF8DWC9CDfhygWA4JMbA-jpxHQB9Y/B4dCAI4DAQZHCAAcEAuWZAAThis is a d/p build i found works well, but i had less success with it than i did with the above build (build editor not up to date, shadow trap is suppose to be prepare shadow portal, deadly trapper is even the odds). Basically play it like burst mesmers used to play: go on to target burst hard and fast then rotate to an unprotected point to decap and drop your portal there, then go to where you can +1 and burst, repeat.So the play style is almost the same as the old d/p builds except you are 100% geared for bursts and mobility, which is why i am suggesting withdraw as you need to hit and run alot, and why marauders resilience is taken over other traits in the adept tier as the extra hp and the damage reduction stacked with the reduction from dash and weakening strikes gives you pseudo protection (doesn't mean you can tank hits but it does mean you can stay in a smaller scale fight longer than what ppl will expect from a burst thief).The issue with this build is that it relies on allies in order to be able to +1 effectively and to be able to abuse shadow portal. If your allies cannot hold fights then all your mobility is worthless and you might as well go afk.

Staff doesn't work well at all in pvp as it is slow and predictable. You will role over ppl sometimes but as a whole the weapon is severely lacking, it has no y axis ports, it has issues gap closing if you are kited (6 initiative 600 range leap is not effective at gap closing against someone who is using multiple skills to create distance) and the auto attack is slow af.

apparently the forums are bugged and you cannot manually click on links idk, just copy and paste the build links in the search bar and it should work.

Well with my staff build i reached high gold pretty easily i dont use vault that often because its so predictable. I could probably go into plat if i grinded out some matches but i think i'll try your build and see how it works, at this point i've given up hope on D/P and i find that shadow portal doesent work half the time especially in combat does regular damage interrupt it or something? its a cool skill tho i used to use shadow trap pre HoT and that worked really nicely. especially since thief could actually duel someone. But i'd like to play some WvW but you basically cant play thief in that mode anymore a Deadeye build well ranger does it a lot better. Stealth is worthless if you are trying to roam and thief has always been bad in zergs and playing staff or S/D in WvW then you might aswell play warrior or some other boring class with invulns for days. feels kinda wasted to have played thief for over 1600 hours and almost 1k PvP matches

[WTF has happened to thief?]

@foste.3098 said:They nerfed auto attack damage across the board on thief weapons. At the moment core s/d is considered meta with other builds ranging from mediocre to good.One thing to get used to is that d/p daredevil no longer works since the steal burst of that build has lost allot of range and therefor is allot easier to see coming, basically d/p doesn't work with the trait setup we used to play it with (i mean it is playable just not very good).

Here is some advice: if you want to role a dead eye then the new shadow arts works well with it, not so much because of stacking long stealth but because of lots of access to it and the fast movement in stealth, so you can pop in and out frequently and reposition all the while always threatening a big burst. Trait for hidden thief and take hide in shadows, smoke bomb and shadow step.For daredevil i found most success by traiting for bound and using it with offhand pistol (with daggeer or sword mh, they both work well with one giving you instant burst the other cc and slower burst). Daredevil has an impressive uptime on weakness due to the master minor trait, coupled with lots of dodges and you have a very durable combatant (altho all your defenses are active and you are vulnerable to burst). If you opt to use sword then pairing the daredevil line with acrobatics (instant reflex, swindlers equilibrium, upper hand) and trickery (usual steal traits) works really well, i myself am playing a daredevil in plat 2 pvp rank.

Yeah i know d/p is kinda shit now tho its my favourite weapon set and i dont like deadeye outside of trying some meme one shots once in a while. I find staff to be pretty decent with acro 1/3/1 and trickery, but i find sword 2 ports to be kinda unreliable sometimes but i kinda wanna give it another try what traits are you using in DD and what amulet(i assume marauders) and what runes/sigils?

[WTF has happened to thief?]

@Yasai.3549 said:Sentry now removes Stealth.

Yu just need to get good vs Warrior.

And yes they nerfed the class alot.

Yeah i know i didnt play flawlessly against that warrior but still feels kinda unfair with the amount of effort i need to put in compared to him also RIP any thief build that semi relies on stealth guess the only option is s/d or staff or i'll just quit the game again and hope they get a grip when it comes to balancing thief. Thing is they already had the d/p balance down decently before they nerfed its auto attack maybe the interupts were a bit to strong and easy to pull off but atleast thief was deadly if you didnt do anything while he was whaling at you but now if i play any build with dagger mainhand you're just an anoying fly nowadays

[WTF has happened to thief?]

I came back after a break recently. I quit right after dagger AA got nerfed into the ground. but what has happened to thief? I played some PvP but unless i played a staff build i deal no damage most builds can just laugh it off and then i tried to do some WvW and noticed you cant even stealth for over 3 seconds if your opponent happens to have a sentry somewhat nearby. Why? you cant even benefit from the extra stealth duration in shadow arts(or the new spider venom in stealth). And also i tried to fight a warrior i couldnt deal any real damage to him and he killed me in 3-4 autos and one real skill like hundred blades or his spin plus 1 auto. this is with full marauders armor and amulet rest is berserker (all Acended if that matters). what have they done to thief? feels like the entire class has been absolutely nutured.