Can someone explain Daredevil to me?

[Nyel.1843]

Hey there,

I'm fairly new to the Thief profession and I started this class because I love Deadeye and find the Specter concept to be really cool. But over the last days, my interest about Daredevil has increased as I read more about it and found its playstyle to be really unique and cool. But I couldn't really make up my mind on how it is played or what its usecase is. Deadeye is long range (power) damage and Specter can either be heal-support or (condi) DPS. But Daredevil? Is it just a (power) DPS or is it similar to Spellbreaker in how it cracks down specific opponents etc.? 

Can some dedicated Thief or Daredevil give me some insights on the core mechanic and how it works in PvE and PvP combat? What are the strenghts and weaknesses? Which opponents does it fight best in PvP and which are the (elite) specs it has problems with?

[Vidit.7108]

Daredevil is a run of the mill melee class. It's gotten a little underpowered over the years because of a lack of serious updates and occasional nerfs. It's similar to Spellbreaker in that it has a lot of movement and CC on it's weapon and utilities. Notably the staff stealth attack is a knockdown and the elite is a chain of cc skills. While best at melee damage, Pistol and Shortbow are about as effective on Daredevil as they are on other thief elite specs.

In PvE it's known for it's really consistent dps as the top and low end damage are really close together. It's pretty simple to learn and most builds involve dodging a few times and then unloading initiative in a big burst during the dodge damage modifier. Recently, the bleeding damage condi variant has passed up staff in Daredevil top damage.

It can also be pretty bulky with extra dodges, more vitality, and endurance refilling traits. If timing dodges to avoid damage is appealing to you then you'll have a lot of fun with it. When set up right, most enemies in open world won't be able to hit you unless you let them. And it's always fun to discover they didn't test a story instance with Daredevil, it never gets old. 

Historically, it's just been core thief+ and most core weapons tied their build to it over deadeye. It's still pretty much just core thief+, so if you want more out of core thief that's what Daredevil gives you. (Except stealth, no new stealth here.)

[DeceiverX.8361]

8 hours ago, Vidit.7108 said:

Daredevil is a run of the mill melee class. It's gotten a little underpowered over the years because of a lack of serious updates and occasional nerfs. It's similar to Spellbreaker in that it has a lot of movement and CC on it's weapon and utilities. Notably the staff stealth attack is a knockdown and the elite is a chain of cc skills. While best at melee damage, Pistol and Shortbow are about as effective on Daredevil as they are on other thief elite specs.

In PvE it's known for it's really consistent dps as the top and low end damage are really close together. It's pretty simple to learn and most builds involve dodging a few times and then unloading initiative in a big burst during the dodge damage modifier. Recently, the bleeding damage condi variant has passed up staff in Daredevil top damage.

It can also be pretty bulky with extra dodges, more vitality, and endurance refilling traits. If timing dodges to avoid damage is appealing to you then you'll have a lot of fun with it. When set up right, most enemies in open world won't be able to hit you unless you let them. And it's always fun to discover they didn't test a story instance with Daredevil, it never gets old. 

Historically, it's just been core thief+ and most core weapons tied their build to it over deadeye. It's still pretty much just core thief+, so if you want more out of core thief that's what Daredevil gives you. (Except stealth, no new stealth here.)

Outside of PvE, arguably significantly better stealth with the new SA, as x/P with Bound->Backstab via BD will give three initiative instantly at the cost of just one evade, making it the best source of initiative gain in the game.

[Nyel.1843]

And what is this Pulmonary Impact I'm reading about?

[Ghost.5637]

On 7/8/2022 at 11:26 AM, Nyel.1843 said:

And what is this Pulmonary Impact I'm reading about?

 

It's a trait within the daredevil line that will hit your enemy with unblockable damage whenever you interrupt one of their skills with a stun, daze, or knock down. Most notably used with offhand pistol 4 skill since it is a spammable daze. Works really well if you can read your opponent and stop them from using skills. 

[Nyel.1843]

3 hours ago, CreedOfGod.9764 said:

 

It's a trait within the daredevil line that will hit your enemy with unblockable damage whenever you interrupt one of their skills with a stun, daze, or knock down. Most notably used with offhand pistol 4 skill since it is a spammable daze. Works really well if you can read your opponent and stop them from using skills. 

The utility skill Fist Flurry -> Palm Strike does trigger a Pulmonary Impact, too - right?

[UNOwen.7132]

3 hours ago, CreedOfGod.9764 said:

 

It's a trait within the daredevil line that will hit your enemy with unblockable damage whenever you interrupt one of their skills with a stun, daze, or knock down. Most notably used with offhand pistol 4 skill since it is a spammable daze. Works really well if you can read your opponent and stop them from using skills. 

More accurately, it used to work really well. Nowadays its worthless, basically completely unusable.

[Nyel.1843]

17 hours ago, UNOwen.7132 said:

More accurately, it used to work really well. Nowadays its worthless, basically completely unusable.

Why?

[UNOwen.7132]

51 minutes ago, Nyel.1843 said:

Why?

It was nerfed way too hard. Nowadays it does like 200 damage, on a glass build. Youre better off just using the low endurance damage buff, even if you only auto it will add more damage.

[Kodama.6453]

On 7/10/2022 at 3:48 PM, UNOwen.7132 said:

It was nerfed way too hard. Nowadays it does like 200 damage, on a glass build. Youre better off just using the low endurance damage buff, even if you only auto it will add more damage.

The difference between PvE and PvP is insane.

3,28 power coefficient in PvE and just 0,75 power coefficient in PvP. The biggest problem holding it back seems to be that it can't crit, tho. But looking at the coefficient, it surely should deal more than 200 damage.

Edited July 12, 2022 by Kodama.6453

[Roche.7491]

On 7/7/2022 at 6:04 PM, Nyel.1843 said:

Hey there,

I'm fairly new to the Thief profession and I started this class because I love Deadeye and find the Specter concept to be really cool. But over the last days, my interest about Daredevil has increased as I read more about it and found its playstyle to be really unique and cool. But I couldn't really make up my mind on how it is played or what its usecase is. Deadeye is long range (power) damage and Specter can either be heal-support or (condi) DPS. But Daredevil? Is it just a (power) DPS or is it similar to Spellbreaker in how it cracks down specific opponents etc.? 

Can some dedicated Thief or Daredevil give me some insights on the core mechanic and how it works in PvE and PvP combat? What are the strenghts and weaknesses? Which opponents does it fight best in PvP and which are the (elite) specs it has problems with?

Daredevil is a basically your standard hack & slash melee warrior in other games. Equip staff then 2, 2, 2 ftw.

And with regards daredevil utility skills, you don’t need any of those. Just use passive buffing signets & some emergency skills & you are good to go.

Edited July 14, 2022 by Roche.7491

[Infinity.2876]

Daredevil is the best melee option for thief and gives enough sustain through evades to do it.

I prefer sword/dagger and short bow instead of dagger/dagger as death blossom got nerfed into irrelevancy for condi. I play condi because I feel more like thief than while using staff.

(Vault has a really high initiative cost but it was my favorite skill on staff otherwise it feels a little aa heavy. I guess I like the novelty of stealing enemies boons)

You can get a lot higher dps on condi than specter but you don't have shroud sustain.

You also have more sustain and cleave than deadeye but sacrifice a lot of damage.

 

It's also argueably the easiest thief profession to learn (anet decided that it wanted all eod specs to be better than pof and hot ones though)

Edited July 14, 2022 by Infinity.2876

[Warkind.6745]

I've always seen the daredevil traitline as an alternative to acrobatics.   It has some damage options, but I get the best use out of its sustain options.

[Jugglemonkey.8741]

On 7/10/2022 at 2:48 PM, UNOwen.7132 said:

It was nerfed way too hard. Nowadays it does like 200 damage, on a glass build. Youre better off just using the low endurance damage buff, even if you only auto it will add more damage.

It was hitting for roughly 900-1k in WvW for me yesterday. Not a lot by itself, but paired with draining and air sigils you get a little over 3k per interrupt which isn't awful. Not what it used to be for sure, but not awful. 

Edit: for context, I was playing S/P bound, one of my old favourite builds that's actually better than I remember. That 3k might be low, but add that onto a tactical strike of 2k followed by a pistol whip and it really starts to hurt. Sure you can't kill necros just by headshotting them 4-5 times anymore but frankly that was pretty degenerate to begin with. 

Edited July 15, 2022 by Jugglemonkey.8741

[UNOwen.7132]

18 hours ago, Jugglemonkey.8741 said:

It was hitting for roughly 900-1k in WvW for me yesterday. Not a lot by itself, but paired with draining and air sigils you get a little over 3k per interrupt which isn't awful. Not what it used to be for sure, but not awful. 

Edit: for context, I was playing S/P bound, one of my old favourite builds that's actually better than I remember. That 3k might be low, but add that onto a tactical strike of 2k followed by a pistol whip and it really starts to hurt. Sure you can't kill necros just by headshotting them 4-5 times anymore but frankly that was pretty degenerate to begin with. 

Huh. Apparently it was shadowbuffed, because it does do more damage than it used to. Still very little, and its still atrocious. Like to give you a perspective, a single pulmonary impact does roughly as much damage as half of dagger 1. Youre better off going havoc-specialist and just autoing lmao. Even with Draining Sigil it aint good. Unironically, to make it work, it should be doing damage in the ballpark of Shadowshot (since youre using initiative to do damage and stop an attack in both cases), so roughly 4-5 times as much as it does right now.