Shadow Arts updates incoming!

[RyuDragnier.9476]

Quote

Thief: The Shadow Arts trait line has been updated to provide better support options to synergize with specter, as well as updated options for stealth and defensive gameplay.

Stated in today's ArenaNet Studio Update.

[Jumpel.3972]

I was expecting a Shadow Art rework for more support option.

Wait & See because they are  either able to give stab on shadowstep or/and a 1sec one stack of power on stealth. We never know what to expect with them....

[Lithril Ashwalker.6230]

Still wont be enough

considering we will still have traits on 300s cooldown and other useless traitlines. They dont care.

Edited June 22, 2022 by Lithril Ashwalker.6230

[kash.9213]

4 minutes ago, Lithril Ashwalker.6230 said:

Still wont be enoygh considering we will still have traits on 300s cooldown and other useless traitlines. They dont care.

I'm a little worried they specified synergizing with SA with specter. I'm more hopeful about the "as well as updated options for stealth and defensive gameplay" part.

If they're doing a legit rework of SA then that's great, but overlooking those long kitten cooldowns again feels like thief players are further being funneled into certain builds, which is the same as funneling people into certain content and whatever prep they require/or access to that content. 

The fact that they're adding stat buffs in place of armor repair in WvW however small already has me worried about some their decisions this round. 

If they scrap the increased stealth duration and actually change SA into something less pigeon holed then I'm all for it and will continue to cry over Acrobatics deep inside. 

[Bern.9613]

Updated is anet's way of saying nerf. More 5 min icd inc. As well as nerfed options for stealth because we can't have a thief being able to stealth like an engi, mesmer or any other profession that has traps. Apparently everyone having reveal skills, traps, reflects, domes, auras and invulns at their disposal just isn't good enough. And defensive gameplay because thief can't teleport with the same frequency and power as a willbender, use 2 skills (point blank, rapid fire) with a power modifier (sic 'em, signet of the wild) at 2000+ range to dismount and kill anyone on a mount. When I started playing in 2012, thief was advertised as the scourge of the battlefield, able to pop in and out of stealth at will, to hit their target. Well thief is truly the scourge with specter healing the crap out of everyone. As for stealth, say goodbye to that soon and hello "updated stealth." Shadow Arts is probably going to be gutted to be used only by specter (which honestly should not even be an elite for thief as thief is suppose to be the assassin not the healer). Group lf a "thief"? Get a willbender rocking sword/sword, greatsword, judge's intervention, flash combo and whirling light (8 shadowsteps/teleports in total) and superior healing.

[Burial.1958]

50 minutes ago, Bern.9613 said:

Updated is anet's way of saying nerf. More 5 min icd inc. As well as nerfed options for stealth because we can't have a thief being able to stealth like an engi, mesmer or any other profession that has traps. Apparently everyone having reveal skills, traps, reflects, domes, auras and invulns at their disposal just isn't good enough. And defensive gameplay because thief can't teleport with the same frequency and power as a willbender, use 2 skills (point blank, rapid fire) with a power modifier (sic 'em, signet of the wild) at 2000+ range to dismount and kill anyone on a mount. When I started playing in 2012, thief was advertised as the scourge of the battlefield, able to pop in and out of stealth at will, to hit their target. Well thief is truly the scourge with specter healing the crap out of everyone. As for stealth, say goodbye to that soon and hello "updated stealth." Shadow Arts is probably going to be gutted to be used only by specter (which honestly should not even be an elite for thief as thief is suppose to be the assassin not the healer). Group lf a "thief"? Get a willbender rocking sword/sword, greatsword, judge's intervention, flash combo and whirling light (8 shadowsteps/teleports in total) and superior healing.

It will be a harsh nerf yep, must be. When Anet says update it means often that it will be trash afterwards. They even wrote it "it should harmonize better with specter". So that means for D/P it will be useless then i guess.

Edited June 22, 2022 by Grebcol.5984

[Vidit.7108]

We will see soon, I'm suspicious that an SA rework will mean better support options at the cost of personal stealth and defense. It could though mean the stealth benefits (like cleanse) are passed over to allies.

I'm reading this to mean they're tampering with core thief to make Specter into a viable PvE healer. Which is keeping with the pattern from the last two specs of making changes to core thief to fix weakness or defect of design on the new elite spec. If we still need high healing power and three wells on Specter I don't see it making any difference. If Scepter/Shroud skills had aoe healing that would make it a pretty good but I think they're just married to the single target concept. Two of the best healers in the game will have alacrity, there would have to be some radical changes to SA be able to keep up with that.

And of course no mention of Acrobatics changes, which would be the trait line that needs the most attention out of all of them.

 

[Jugglemonkey.8741]

3 minutes ago, Grebcol.5984 said:

It will be a harsh nerf yep, must be. When Anet says update it means often that it will be trash afterwards.

The funny thing is, even if you're right, people will still find something about SA to complain about. 

[Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497]

Stealth will now apply faerie fire to thief, rendering stealth moot.

[Burial.1958]

13 minutes ago, Jugglemonkey.8741 said:

The funny thing is, even if you're right, people will still find something about SA to complain about. 

For sure.

But what i do not understand why they didn't nerfed SA slight (Take the heal out of SA Grandmaster) and rework the Acro traitline. There we need more defensive options and not in SA.

 

For me the devs really look like out of touch with this class. I mean most of us choosed this class because it is a Rouge DMG dealer and not a personal healbot for the commander.

Edited June 22, 2022 by Grebcol.5984

[Lithril Ashwalker.6230]

honestly they just need to redo ALL especs for thief...no all especs and go back to baseline for what the base itself was supposed to do to eliminate the pseudo holy trinity that has become of it. tanks, healers and dps is all i see and even then support isnt always needed. it needs a full reset and back to the drawing board instead of bandaiding everything with tweaks and stuff. things that were overpowered arent anymore and are needed to be on par...just on PAR with what exists today competitively. i mean the 300s cooldown traits were supposed to be placeholders...why are they locking the traits this way when they can simply revert them. they honestly have no idea how to design a profession. at this point BF2042's DICE could have done a better job at balancing classes

[RyuDragnier.9476]

7 minutes ago, Grebcol.5984 said:

For me the devs really look like out of touch with this class. I mean most of us choosed this class because it is a Rouge DMG dealer and not a personal healbot for the commander.

It's just how the game is with the "any job capable of doing anything" mindset of the game. Thief cannot be just about the Rogue DMG in such a game, it has to be able to do other things.

[Burial.1958]

Just now, RyuDragnier.9476 said:

It's just how the game is with the "any job capable of doing anything" mindset of the game. Thief cannot be just about the Rogue DMG in such a game, it has to be able to do other things.

being a personal healbot? I go play tetris thats more fun than that. Then support is much better done on other classes or did i ever saw a lfm for specter in wvw?

[RyuDragnier.9476]

1 minute ago, Grebcol.5984 said:

being a personal healbot? I go play tetris thats more fun than that. Then support is much better done on other classes or did i ever saw a lfm for specter in wvw?

So you're confirming that SA needs to be changed for such a build to come into existence in WvW?

[Burial.1958]

3 minutes ago, RyuDragnier.9476 said:

So you're confirming that SA needs to be changed for such a build to come into existence in WvW?

Why has SA to be a Support Traitline? Why not Acro when this traitline is trashed with 300S traits and is i need of a big rework?

Edited June 22, 2022 by Grebcol.5984

[Lithril Ashwalker.6230]

4 minutes ago, Grebcol.5984 said:

Why has SA to be a Support Traitline? Why not Acro when this traitline is trashed with 300S traits and is i need of a big rework?

if anything they could make some of the skills based on how often you crit or something...look at guild wars 1 assassin like Shroud of Distress or something...critical eye..all of those skills were bomb and had more synergy than this half eaten lasagnia sandwhich they call a thief

[RyuDragnier.9476]

6 minutes ago, Grebcol.5984 said:

Why has SA to be a Support Traitline? Why not Acro when this traitline is trashed with 300S traits and is i need of a big rework?

Because SA from the beginning comes across as a support line. You're healing others in stealth, you're healing others from shadowstepping, you're removing boons with stealth attacks. If you're thinking of a tanky line, that's Acrobatics, which as we all know is pretty useless nowadays, yet it's filled to the brim with traits that help you stay alive in the thick of battle.

Edited June 22, 2022 by RyuDragnier.9476

[senftube.6081]

13 minutes ago, RyuDragnier.9476 said:

Because SA from the beginning comes across as a support line. You're healing others in stealth, you're healing others from shadowstepping, you're removing boons with stealth attacks. If you're thinking of a tanky line, that's Acrobatics, which as we all know is pretty useless nowadays, yet it's filled to the brim with traits that help you stay alive in the thick of battle.

No one took SA for Support. But now ArenaNet comes around the corner and force the players to play the specter. D/P dead + Deadeye dead check.

[Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497]

25 minutes ago, RyuDragnier.9476 said:

It's just how the game is with the "any job capable of doing anything" mindset of the game. Thief cannot be just about the Rogue DMG in such a game, it has to be able to do other things.

It was more than that back then.

 

Every class could do a bit of everything so you wouldn't need tanks or healers. Every class was also supposed to be good at specific things and weak in some areas.

 

That got lost. Thief was supposed to be a strong 1v1 duelist with high risks and rewards. It got shafted hard into a +1 meme where it gets out bursted by every class. And now is expected to be a heal bot for one dude when they get a support spec.

[Demented Lemur.7861]

Also

17 minutes ago, RyuDragnier.9476 said:

Because SA from the beginning comes across as a support line. You're healing others in stealth, you're healing others from shadowstepping, you're removing boons with stealth attacks. If you're thinking of a tanky line, that's Acrobatics, which as we all know is pretty useless nowadays, yet it's filled to the brim with traits that help you stay alive in the thick of battle.

Also there is already 2 dps trait line  in critical and deadly arts.

[Biziut.3594]

When i was reading this post about professions, I couldn't help it but I feel like i was reading something like that.

All Professions: You can alac, quick or heal now ! 

Teef: Soo... whatever, we did some stuff to Shadow Arts I guess, some boons or whatever, get some stealth and defense soo likeee kittykitten off now... kay thanks. (In game with PvE that is all about doing DPS, DPS+Boon or Heal and obviously Thief can't heal) 

They could at least make some changes to our alac so it don't fall short when compared to other alac givers, but no let's add even more alac givers that will do alac 100% better and with no effort at all. (guess it will be something like that). 

Edited June 22, 2022 by Biziut.3594

[Vidit.7108]

I think there are some "newish" people in here. Back in the day (i'm talking Hot era and pre-HoT) SA was about extracting from stealth, the most selfish benefits possible. Thief builds used to do a lot of stealth attacks for big burst damage, hence why you regen initiative in stealth. It created reasons to be lying in wait. 

In the old trait system you could gain initiative just for going into stealth. It was never really thief's group "support" traitline, though it has had some traits like that. Buffs that it could give a group were also more offensive, most famously venom share, which is now a baseline effect of venom utilities. It's why leeching venom is still there in the trait line as SA used to be a part of making a venom stealth dagger build in PvE/WvW/PvP. It wasn't buffing your damage per-se but was responsible for creating that style of gameplay. 

If the plan is to make SA a full group support trait line, and especially if they took away Meld with Shadows, what aspects there were of stealth as offensive gameplay will almost vanish from thief. If they plan on making the benefits of being in stealth apply to allies I can't imagine in PvP/WvW that it does not accompany a duration nerf. They would have to at least reduce the duration for allies. That's all hypothetical though, I have no idea what they will do and I'm not exactly worried about it until Friday.

[Doggie.3184]

Don't forget Acrobatics also exists though. XD

Hey, give it group Quickness 😛

I hope whatever they're doing to Shadow Arts replaces the absolute trash tier shadowstep healing mechanic on Specter. Healing Specter is the most unfun gameplay mechanic I've ever experienced in an MMO. And I'm not talking about the cast and forget Shroud AoE heal which is generally the only thing people use since it's just a side-effect of DPS rotation~ it's everything else they expected us to do.

Then they can remove Shadowstep from Scepter/Pistol.

Edited June 23, 2022 by Doggie.3184

[GewRoo.4172]

Kill Shadow Arts！

[Cynz.9437]

10 hours ago, Biziut.3594 said:

When i was reading this post about professions, I couldn't help it but I feel like i was reading something like that.

All Professions: You can alac, quick or heal now ! 

Teef: Soo... whatever, we did some stuff to Shadow Arts I guess, some boons or whatever, get some stealth and defense soo likeee kittykitten off now... kay thanks. (In game with PvE that is all about doing DPS, DPS+Boon or Heal and obviously Thief can't heal) 

They could at least make some changes to our alac so it don't fall short when compared to other alac givers, but no let's add even more alac givers that will do alac 100% better and with no effort at all. (guess it will be something like that). 

 

I felt the same. Everyone gets alac/quickness... we get some more SA synergy with specter!!! (people still won't want specter as support, let's face it, because the spec itself has huge problems and just falls behind every other class by huge margin), some stealth and yea... that's it.

Silence about acro is... troubling.

I fear they just wanted to kill d/p, DE that is all.

Edited June 23, 2022 by Cynz.9437