NorthernRedStar.3054

untrue, most people who prefer pre-patch are mostly active players i saw on the forum even before feb 25, and actually most people who like meta now, are people who i have not see any at all pre-patch in forum or in game pre-patch and even now.this is not about holo/ranger/rev being too much sustain(in fact these builds die super fast if you pick the counter build). it's about not having any skill involvement in the game. see if they nerf sustain again, you people will again complain about too much damage. so these are really pointless, what's important is that if this meta is fun/skillful to play or fight in. which currently, condition rev is definitely the degenerate of power rev, and daredevil is degenerate of core thief, so is defense warrior, it's passive, it's boring and it lives too long and still does good damage, what's the different? skill/fun. in fact ,i would like to think anyone who enjoys the current meta compared to feb 25th meta might be low tier players, since the only difference is basically now requires less skill to play and die slower.also it is almost the same boring meta that killed pvp scene HoT, but you wouldn't know, while most people who dislike the current meta know because they played. Also this.

^ This.

Nice bait.

Still lose points? Mmm! Gonna see them shortly w/o punishments? Mmmmmmmm!!

I can out-duel a condi thief on DD no problem in most cases. But it takes far more effort than it takes for them to simply "haha condi unloads brr brr!" and "haha stealth bzz bzz". In other words, an inexperienced noob can reap rewards similar to an experienced player with this build. This should never happen, it's not a maintainable way to develop your game if you want to keep your player base intact. This goes for a lot of builds currently, from core necro (which is, thankfully, a lot more manageable now) to condi rev. They allow worse players to bypass certain mechanical stepping stones completely - such as consistency. A power build player, post-February patch in particular, has to consistently land (read: all the time) every key skill in their kit in order to kill someone in a 1v1, sometimes even 1v2 scenario (looking at weaver and necro). Does this standard hold for condi builds in a lot of cases? Nope.

Good players still pub-stomp. Having a build that allowed you to pub-stomp taken from you making you suddenly unable to pub-stomp means you weren't as good as you thought/were being carried harder than you thought..(some exceptions made for chrono.) Ye, that's why rezzing's been complained about for months. Google 'pub-stomp'. 'Course you're still gonna beat people you outskill in a 1v1. It's a whole different matter how long it's going to take, and that has a massive effect on the game. You need to severely out-do a 1v2 to down both players at the same time. But of course low-grade players feel better about themselves now. That was the whole point of these changes.

ok sure, but 1 hour dishonor ? come on you ruin the game for 9 other people. 1 hour is perfectly fine if you are continuously doing it. Do you know how to read dude ? I said that the internet fails and the games disconects. It's not like I want to do itYou enter the queue fully aware that you have a crappy internet. Thus, you intentionally ruin those games for 9 other people. How is this hard to grasp? If I let my guard dog loose freely and it bites someone, do I get to blame the dog?

Not true. Also not true. There are several more builds that were pushed out by the meta before that are viable now per class, but a large number of people have been spoiled by ez-bake damage and are now clinging desperately onto whatever gives them even a shred of that back. Boo-hoo, my "fun for all!" -build got pushed into viability because good players can't pub-stomp me anymore because Anet gutted all their damage! Yay me!

Oh, really? Maybe they use another forum for this, because I can't see any of them here. I see some folks who don't know how thief skills work and who do not even try to learn something new and become better in this game. Here is news for you, any power based build will "100-0" you in seconds if you stay put and don't use stun breakers, blocks and other stuff. Here is suggestion for those who struggle in pvp and against thieves particularly - post your video here and people who know how to play pvp (I believe there are some) will help you to improve. One doesn't have to struggle against a build to call out the BS it has. He never said these players are using written word, that's all your make-up. No one respects a condi thief, so you can have that attitude and throw it out of a window. So you have no problems with thieves but thieves is BSSo there is no evidenve of "vast majority of the top tier pvp players acknowledge this build is broken" but who caresSo you don't want to become better it PvP because you on behalf of everyone do not respect condi thief... Well guess I can't help it, ppl like you really exixt.Hate people like you. Taking words and twisting them out of their original context and meaning. Although you aren't even doing that right.

Oh, really? Maybe they use another forum for this, because I can't see any of them here. I see some folks who don't know how thief skills work and who do not even try to learn something new and become better in this game. Here is news for you, any power based build will "100-0" you in seconds if you stay put and don't use stun breakers, blocks and other stuff. Here is suggestion for those who struggle in pvp and against thieves particularly - post your video here and people who know how to play pvp (I believe there are some) will help you to improve. One doesn't have to struggle against a build to call out the BS it has. He never said these players are using written word, that's all your make-up. No one respects a condi thief, so you can have that attitude and throw it out of a window.

I thought anyone half-decent is able to cover up their animations, either via terrain or with canceling. Also, a full-range Steal is more than enough to land Cloak and Dagger consistently. If there's a ranger with a pet or a mesmer with a clone, you can use it.

It's hella boring and monotone to play with and against. I don't understand how anyone is defending this build. people that got hardcarried by it, its hard to find a build that 1shots people with 2 abilities from stealth, it nullifies many build from playability just by existing ^ This is the main problem with the P/D Condi Thief. Some builds can counter it. But other builds get countered so hard by it, that their class doesn't possess the mechanics required to feasibly deal with the build at all. The problem occurs when the Thief is smart enough to avoid anything that may threaten him and only go at things that very seriously have 0% chance of dealing with his build. When that happens, it starts breaking the game. No class/build should ever have any arrangement of selections whatsoever that allow the abovementioned effect to occur. Couldn’t the same be said about a ton of other builds though? Is the problem that it’s efficient against too many builds? At most I would say leave the damage the same and remove some of the cover conditions so it’s easier to get the poison. But the main burst comes from the initial attack with venom utility applied. And if they’re running thieves guild with poison share, then yes, there’s little you can do other than cleave they thieves guild down or try to kite. But thieves guild even on a power build is pretty strong. To be honest though, you can build a chrono to play pretty similarly. This build is kind of necessary in this meta though as a thief to be able to be efficient against bunkers. And in high level gameplay I doubt this build is that much of an issue. It’s still heavily dependent on having a good team and if you’re running core you’re sacrificing mobility. there is couple of things wrong with the build.1 it can duel people as the most mobile build in the game bar other thief.2 it can 100%-0% people instantly from stealth unless they have cleanse that can bypass their cover condis, and the slower you are to cleanse the more cover you have to go through.3 poison share is whacky with AI, giving 18 stacks of poison to AI that persists for 30s is stupid level of area denial. I honestly dont even think thief would use the poison if the AI wouldnt be so broken with it.4 It makes every build without insta burst condi clear unplayable, its not like condi mes where you can avoid their burst due to torch 4 delay or keeping distance from clones to not get mass F2 shattered, you give ground but you are safe. No thief gains 15s stealth and at any moment he can jump on you from 1200 range and apply this level of damage.5 all the while it can 1v1, chase people down and bully specific builds it still is very good +1 build, perma poison reduces healing, landing steal deals massive damage and as for utility they can spam the immob to shut down escape, all the while applying some damage, and even if you have good cleanseing, constant immob spam will force it out of you unless you have some VERY specific way of escaping.the only class I know that has good burst clear to contest this type of build is warrior due to shake it off and low CD mass cleanse healing skill, but warrior is in a bad spot and to top it off they cant reach thief anyways. 1) Ok so it can duel. That isn’t really a reason to nerf it. Plenty of these flavor of the month thieves are not winning those duels, however. 2) The cover condi isn’t particularly long duration. Mass cleanse of 4-5 will probably get rid of most of it. 3) Totally agree here. I’ve said for years that Spider Venom sharing is hard to balance. Six stacks is a lot but manageable. 18-30 stacks with a few human allies, or paired with a Mesmer + clones, and suddenly you are insanely powerful in spike damage. So yeah, the Thieves Guild version is actually much weaker than duo’ed with a condi Mesmer who coordinates with the venom share. A minion necro can also be a good teammate for this kind of gameplay. 4) I’d disagree about the need to burst cleanse yourself in all cases. There are several builds that draw condi onto themselves and then mass cleanse. Team play, generally, is the solution to a build that shines most when sharing venoms to its own team. Solo 1v1, you should have enough cleanse to handle the burst of condi or something to cleave down the Thieves Guild (part of the problem here is power might have been nerfed a little too much and now Thieves Guild just has a lot of HP, maybe too much). 5) Steal actually applies that poison, when traited, over a long period. The tick damage isn’t that much. The immobilize spam is on a super slow projectile that can be strafed rather easily. Don’t run in a straight line and you won’t get hit over 500 range. 6) Good warriors are actually best able to gap close then stun. The key is baiting the Shadowstep and then kiting in the opposite direction. They will just Shadow Return if you chase them at that point. They will probably go the full 1200 with Shadowstep so moving in the opposite direction puts you out of range of Steal. If they chase you then they will have lost two stun breaks and a huge part of their in combat mobility. Not only warrior can take advantage of that btw, Ranger variants with GS can use the mobility and blocking to gap close when it makes sense and put lots of pressure on the thief. Bonus: if they tried to gank you after stealthing for a long duration they probably won’t have any stealth available to escape with if they aren’t able to pull off the kill. ~ Just quoting this whole thing to get everyone's name in here for mention. Ok so, going more into detail about my previous comment:It has way too much stealth. The frequency of stealth application and the uptime of those stealths is way too much. It allows this build to appear, land a huge burst and immediately vanish/teleport play away, rinse/repeat do the same thing again. Builds that do not have reveal or teleport or even both, have little to no opening at all to even land damage on the Thief.You can't effectively use LOS against P/D in the same way you could a DE or Ranger Longbow. This is because the P/D Thief is not only stealthing constantly to confuse you as to where the hell it is actually at, but it is also using teleport spam play to be able to get around the LOS easily, even when you are LOSing. So this build has some mechanics in play that allow it to get around a fundamentally important technique that builds require to effectively counter play ranged. So here, unless a build has A LOT of similar disengage mobility like ground target teleports or stealthing or mobility skills to stay moving, it becomes a sitting duck that is going to lose in time to the P/D, no question about it. Of course reflects and other defensive utilities matter, but unless a build is essentially maximized around these sorts of things, the P/D is currently pumping out way too much damage too frequently for even bunkers to sustain.And then finally, the damage burst output is too much for how frequent it is. I mean seriously, this build is pumping out a ridiculous amount of actual DPS. The hilarious thing is that we aren't talking just "burst" here. No, this build has a rather extreme amount of sustained damage output. So yeah, going back into what I was saying in the original comment. There simply are not enough classes/builds in play right now that can meet the current patching of P/D on an even level field, to justify how powerful that patching currently is. A super easy to understand analogy for what P/D feels like in matches right now: RED Team:It has a P/D on it who is a "Rock" BLUE Team:ScissorsScissorsScissorsRockPaperI mean, this is pretty self-explanatory to anyone who's played with and/or against pistol thief.

Condi trapper wars.

The difference is, power builds miss their burst skills, they're "out" for ~20 seconds with only autos (which hit like paw paws now) to rely on. Because CC skills deal 0 damage, they cannot be used in the actual DPS rotation = longer downtimes per weapon set. Condi on the other hand relies mostly on passive traits and select low-cooldown skills that can be used in a more rapid succession than power atm. Pistol thief is perhaps one of the worst offenders.

I never had any problem vs Condi DH but there is a guy with 5 alts, all are in legendary. He plays burn DH. EU btw He even posted here: https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/104445/mission-accomplished I know the guy, still doesn't warrant a rune to be removed.Of course not. It'd be a terrible shame if condi noobs lost another tool in their low effort arsenal.

Full of low risk/high reward noob builds for beginners, just like Anet wanted.

It's hella boring and monotone to play with and against. I don't understand how anyone is defending this build. people that got hardcarried by it, its hard to find a build that 1shots people with 2 abilities from stealth, it nullifies many build from playability just by existing ^ This is the main problem with the P/D Condi Thief. Some builds can counter it. But other builds get countered so hard by it, that their class doesn't possess the mechanics required to feasibly deal with the build at all. The problem occurs when the Thief is smart enough to avoid anything that may threaten him and only go at things that very seriously have 0% chance of dealing with his build. When that happens, it starts breaking the game. No class/build should ever have any arrangement of selections whatsoever that allow the abovementioned effect to occur.Agreed, this was one of the reasons why the new rune system, at least in the beginning, COMPLETELY ruined League of Legends. Since you could not properly adapt your setup based on each matchup (by selecting armor instead of magic pen, for example), you'd have a very clearly defined matchup sheet of favored/unfavored ones. What does this do? Well, obviously it diminishes the skill cap AND floor, since players knowing their champions inside out are at a major disadvantage regardless of how well they know their mechanics and trades. Meanwhile, any noob can pick up a champion that's relatively good against the opposition, and pilot at a level they don't belong in. Or, in layman's words, this is an artificial way of evening out skill difference.

It's hella boring and monotone to play with and against. I don't understand how anyone is defending this build.

Was expecting p/d thief. How disappointing.

It wouldn't be so good if condi wasn't overtuned, though. Granted, the design is still bad and outdated - particularly now.

Shadow plays ranger thoFunniest thing is... he was very defensive about birds and 2 months laters he basically saying the same as I did... It took 2 month to realize. (apparently "just kill the pet" doesnt work anymore :D ) People use birds out of need, not "abuse". Times change.What do I read there ? Its fine to be broken because you feel like its "needed" ?That's your odd interpretation, not me.

Shadow plays ranger thoFunniest thing is... he was very defensive about birds and 2 months laters he basically saying the same as I did... It took 2 month to realize. (apparently "just kill the pet" doesnt work anymore :D )People use birds out of need, not "abuse". Times change.

After birds get toned down you'll be complaining about WS, then move back onto Marksmanship, then pet CC (with a tell), then probably Point-Blank Shot etc. The caster mains on this forum.

I do have taken notice that caster mains around here tend to whine a lot. Apparently their class is always underperforming.

It's not dead. Power builds 'r still viable across the board if you're a good player. Just, condi builds across the board reap rewards more easily and effortlessly. This combined with increased sustain vs power builds makes winning duels without being +1'd as power extremely tedious and unlikely - unless the skill gap is large.