Twilight Tempest.7584

My advice is to stop misrepresenting reality in order to avoid getting better. Way to ignore the part where I said "except for certain meme builds (most of which are not thieves) that can stealth from afar, and burst you from thin air" (paraphrasing), there is counterplay. Blocks are typically channeled and many are subtly telegraphed. You'd be surprised how much burst gets wasted into Blocks. Especially now that Daredevil no longer has unblockable steal. Knowing your opponent's build, cooldowns, and predicting their movements IS a part of (skilled) competitive play. Good players do not need to see their opponent 100% of the time to fight them. Just ask good players. Or... keep pretending the most nerfed class in the game is still broken because it relieves you of having to improve. Your choice. I did. Then after I learned how Thief works, I went back to it (and others) and play those even more. Now, unless they're really good, Thieves don't trouble me much anymore. I went from frozen in fear ("OMG they disappeared, now what do I do?) to "bring it on!" And I'm not even the best player. Far from it. Just telling how I got over my Thiefphobia, for any who will listen. Of course. See above. Mesmer was my first and main. Ele is my third most played in WvW, after Thief. Both can deal with Thief just fine in the current balance. Stop being me before I played Thief. Play Thief for a while, go back to Mes/Ele. Profit. -- Everyone drop some Confused faces telling us you need to learn some Thief instead of QQing on a forum!

Does this apply to Mesmer, Ranger, Engi, and Guard (DH) too, or only Thief?

Reveal is not the only way to deal with stealth. I hate having to dedicate utility slots to projectile denial just in case of sniper rangers or Harbingers, but they're part of the game. If you want to roam, build to deal with other roamers. Hotkey build/gear templates to swap between roles quickly.

Last time I checked, Shocking Aura is pretty good at stopping those pesky poke poke thieves, Stoneheart says nope to basically any power build, and Magnetic Aura spam says stop shooting yourself to pew pew Deadeyes. And don't even get me started on how broken Catalyst is, which got nerfed in PvP, but not WvW.

If nothing else, this discussion confirms what we already knew: Popular Opinion: Stealth sucks! Delete thief now! Unpopular Opinion: Stealth has ample counterplay but most don't bother to learn. Even though Thief is the first or second most nerfed class in the game's history (depending on whether you're talking to Mesmers 😅), there are still areas Thieves/stealth could be reigned in, but as long as Thief is stealth dependent, people will continue to complain, no matter how much stealth's nerfed. That second, nuanced opinion will collect "Confused" reactions for days. Yet practically no responses actually countering what was said. Internet anonymity amirite? 😄 >> Hey, drop a "Confused" reaction here if you've never played Thief in competitive for more than 50 hours. Prove me wrong! <<

Except, there is actually plenty of counterplay to stealth. It just takes some game knowledge and experience. Other than the most meme builds--typically nade-Engis, power Mesmers, or Soulbeasts, capable of stealthing out of sight, getting into range, and then unloading a death sentence in seconds from thin air, there are several ways of countering stealth users, especially melee-thieves. People aren't really interested in learning to play if they believe stealth lacks counterplay. Even without access to Reveal, every class can: jump, change direction, and abuse no-port spots to neutralize Backstabs. They can use blocks, invulns, evades, auras, skills like Infuse Light, Defiant Stance, Full Counter, and drop and stand in AOEs, etc. if they think a big stealth attack is incoming. And yes, knowing when to use these does involve being able to read one's opponent, something applicable to all matchups. A lot of these are why Dragonhunter hard-counters melee thieves. And Willbender is every bit as bursty and mobile, all while wearing heavy armor. Meanwhile, thieves are so squishy, even though hard to hit, they can't survive more than a couple good hits. If stealth were everything, no one on a non-stealth class would be able to beat someone on a stealth build at the same skill level. But we know that's not the case. Far from it. A number of builds give thieves a hard time, stealth and all. It's tired wisdom but nonetheless true: The best advice to anyone struggling against thieves or stealth is to play those builds. They are guaranteed to: (1) realize it's not as easy or broken as it looks, and (2) get much better, comfortable even, at engaging thieves on other classes. That's what I did.

Even though this can already happen to an extent (projectiles shot before stealthing will track and hit the target in stealth; it's possible to knock thieves out of their Shadow Refuge, ending their stealth and revealing them), I think this is fair. But you know what? We'll still get 20+ liked thief/stealth QQ threads that go on for pages and the OP never returns, like we have after every incremental thief/stealth nerf over the years. It's like... a right of passage for every new player the first time they get smacked by a thief. Only some never get over it and carry the grudge well into their later years. Because stealth is hands-down the most despised mechanic in competitive modes. People detest "perma stealth" more than "perma-invuln", "perma-block", or the chaining of the two. They hate being boomed by glass cannon thieves more than any of the other "1-shot" builds that can do it from range (Soulbeast, Mesmer, Engi, Ele). They even hate it more than the heavy-armor thief that bursts and runs for days, perhaps only because it trades stealth for invuln and block (Willbender)--unless Dragonhunter, in which case, stealth still applies. All of these are okay, but stealth thief will never be. Would love to poll all the thief/stealth haters to see what percent of them even have more than 100 hours on thief in competitive modes. Any guesses?

Daredevil should donate a dodge to Mirage. Then all will be right. 😊

Glad you brought this up, as I was about to edit my post to include this. Why? Because it shows how the overall Shadow Arts rework was expressly designed to encourage frequent entering and exiting stealth in order to gain the benefits of these traits. I.E., NOT "perma-stealthing." Which again, is what the OP's concern is: By preventing stealth with more Revealed, the proposal of this topic, there will be less ability to enter and exit stealth, and therefore, less ability to benefit from the Shadow Arts reworks. People don't realize how much of a chain-effect is involved by simply restricting access to stealth. The Shadow Arts rework also shows that, at least in theory, Anet understands that reducing a spec's primary defense (in this case, stealth) requires compensating with other methods of sustain (Superspeed, Regeneration, Cleanse, Initiative). So if, as this topic seems to advocate, we were to further hamper stealth, what are we prepared to give in return? Whatever it is, it would have to be independent of stealth use, since that's getting reduced. Blocks and invulns for thieves? Never. So that leaves reducing other spec's defenses by a similar margin. Only fair, right? Do people care about fairness, or just killing specs they personally disfavor? People still talking about "perma stealth" in 2023 should try it and see just how viable it is(n't).

I fully expected a lot of "confused" reactions to my and other posts comparing stealth to other specs' defensive abilities. There are a lot of stealth haters and most of them have never played a stealth-dependent build for a serious amount of time. I strongly suggest they do so if they believe stealth is so great, especially in 2023. With respect to stealth, which is the topic of this discussion, Shadow Arts was nerfed. In the June 28, 2022 update, Stealth duration was reduced by reworking traits like Meld with Shadows (increased stealth duration) and Hidden Thief (stealth on steal). Some things like Superspeed during stealth were added to compensate, but stealth duration itself was very much nerfed.

Sure, Sniff can apply revealed if it also applies a debuff that prohibits Aegis/Blocks and Invuln for the same duration. Deal? 🙂 WvW is already rife with Reveals via the Marked mechanic. Marked effectively prevents "perma stealthing" by cancelling stealth after a few seconds and applying Revealed, which further locks out stealth for its duration. There are also the Watchtower upgrade and Sentries that apply Marked. Then there are various skills that apply Revealed, like Sic'Em, not to mention the self-reveal of Death's Judgment. Revealed duration was also increased some years back. The Shadow Arts trait line on Thief was nerfed last year to significantly reduce stealth duration. Add to this that the only reveal-counter, Shadow Meld, was stripped of its ability to remove Revealed just a week ago, and "perma-stealthing" really isn't a thing. Stealth has taken a lot of hits over the years, and especially recently. Yet the specs that depend on it to survive were not designed around such reduced access to stealth. They lack the block and invuln spam of other specs. People who don't play stealth classes tend not to realize that as annoying as it may feel to play against, stealth is their primary means of defense. How would the block and invuln-heavy classes feel to play if built-in game mechanics and other players' skills could totally disable their defenses? TL;DR: There's more than enough Revealed relative to stealth access in WvW already.

My thought exactly. The counter to the stealth-counter was always kind of silly and is one of the most frequent complaints by stealth haters. But at least give something back to make Shadow Meld even worth considering for the elite slot. Another skill in the dustbin.

True, that's been a thing for a while now. Their perma-queued EBG leaves them no choice lol.

I mean, they can just do the other 6/7 achievements and get full rewards? And still spawn camp EBG all week.

I noticed this too. Defending is already unrewarding to begin with. The new achievements only increase the reward gap, and further reinforce zerg and k-train playstyles, which is where rewards and progression were already concentrated.

As a Mesmer main since starting, I'm going to have to come out and say giving Distortion to block-heavy Virtuoso is definitely not the way to foster interactive combat with intuitive counterplay in competitive modes. Way, way too much "can't touch me" up time while being able to attack (during Distortion) and even be bursty. And unblockable attacks are not common. By giving Virtuoso Distortion, Anet painted a big bright "nerf me" target on its back, and we know how the track record on nerfs is. This comparison is a stretch at best. Stealth ≠ invuln. In stealth, you take damage and get tracked by projectiles, ranged NPCs, and savvy players throwing AOEs and cleaves all the time. Stealth is also hindered by Marked (in WvW), can be cancelled by Reveal, or even by knocking a Thief out of their Shadow Refuge. Everyone's seen a thief come out of stealth in downstate. And unlike Distortion, if a thief is stealthed, they're not attacking. Period. Shroud is an even worse comparison. Definitely not invuln. Still subject to CC, and yes, damage, even if they temporarily have a second health bar. Just because you shouldn't waste big cool downs into shroud 1v1 doesn't mean you can't play around it. It is also much more telegraphed and can even be interrupted, unlike instant-cast Distortion. Distortion is invuln with the ability to simultaneously use any skills. That's as good as it gets. It has no equal, not by a long shot. Are you kidding? All the meta weapons have AOEs/bounces/cleave. GS, SW, Axe, Staff... Mesmer in general has other problems--possibly the biggest hack job to trait lines of any profession in the name of balancing, and a minimum of two dodges should be standard game-wide, no exceptions. But dramatically upping Virtuoso's "can't touch me" up time is not the way.

Well it's another week as Team Red--4 weeks in a row, and 6 of the last 7 weeks for me, all while coming in dead last in the entire WvW ladder (40+ victory points behind the other T4 teams last week). Why is the dead last team in the mode always the same red color, with its DBL and EBG position, as the previous week's winner in any given tier? Something tells me not even Anet has a good reason. At a minimum, I think the two teams that don't change tiers in T1 and T4 should alternate colors. In T1, they'd alternate between blue and green since the previous week's T2 winner would assume red. In T4, they'd alternate between red and blue, since the previous week's T3 loser would assume green. However, if there's any truth to the perception that red is somewhat more challenging while green is less so, the first place team in T1 ought to be red the next week, and the last place team in T4 ought to be green the next week. A minor handicap for the top team and a minor assist for the bottom team as it were. Otherwise, just totally randomize the color assignments. It sucks being perma stuck on any color 7 out of 8 weeks of the match. 😕

Whataboutism and strawman arguments at their finest. Or do point to where I kid myself by saying cele harb is the only thing broken in WvW. And how would you know whether anyone is offended at being told cele harb is busted unless you were part of the DMs I've had with said players in game?

The hit to frame rates would surely hinder the invaders!

Whether Desert home BL is an advantage or disadvantage is certainly debatable. But the map differences aren't just limited to DBL. EBG is an asymmetric map. The Wiki suggests that red garrison is the most challenging to defend, while green's is the easiest. Regardless, there's no ignoring the inconsistency within the mode's own internal logic: Right now, both winning teams (those moving up a tier), and the third place team in T4 (the absolute bottom of the WvW ladder), are assigned Red. I don't know if the latter is always like that, but it has been for the past three weeks and counting in the current link. If DBL is an advantage, it makes no sense for winning teams to get it the following week. If it's a disadvantage, it makes no sense for the weakest team in WvW to be stuck on it week after week.

If: RBL is generally disliked and seen as a disadvantage to have as HBL; Teams that place first in a match and move up a tier (winners) are assigned red HBL; and Teams that place third in a match and move down a tier (losers) are assigned green HBL; then Why does the losing-est team in the entire ladder get perma-stuck on T4 RBL? This is now three weeks in a row and counting on RBL, not to mention another week prior to the last World Restructuring beta week, and in my personal case, during the beta week as well. That's 5 out of the last 6 weeks on RBL for me, all while coming in dead last (not even close scores). I know rankings don't matter other than for matchmaking, but HBL assignments do affect the match experience. Red HBL is not insurmountable, but it's certainly a handicap/disadvantage an already struggling team does not need. Wouldn't it make more sense for the third place team in T4 to be assigned GBL if they must be stuck on anything week after week?

Imagine equating theoretical build options with actual in-game representation.

Somewhere in the past year (?) Anet acknowledged the WvW-compared-to-other-modes rewards disparity and the glacial rate of Skirmish Ticket gain, and suggested they want to improve these as part of their efforts towards making WvW a "cornerstone" game mode. While it would seem relatively simple to implement, I suppose it's paced with World Restructuring development.

Did you even watch the video? The guy who said he thinks the berserk variant of this build is strongest, lost! Despite being big-brained by Vallun, he probably wouldn't have gone down so fast, if at all, had he not been pure glass. Unlike all the cele-condi or condi-tank builds running around. One guy giving the opinion that the power variant of a specific build is better than the cele version of that build ≠ condi builds in general are not OP. It's one guys' opinion, about one specific build, and nothing more. 8 out of 10 meta builds being power, even if accurate ≠ condi builds in general are not OP. For instance, what if there are only 2 out of 10 meta builds that are condi, but 50% or more of the population plays them? What would that suggest? Yes, condi can be cleansed, but it also ignores armor, tends to be spammy, ranged, subtlely animated, and allows building heavily into survivability since it only depends on 1-2 stats.

IME a lot of cele harbinger players are remarkably ignorant they're playing a busted build, and get super offended if you point it out. Kinda like the ones in here.