The Penalties of Being A Good Thief

[AikijinX.6258]

These are some of the penalties or handicaps Thieves had to endure and adapt to over the many years worth of ‘balances’ due to playing too well OR over performing with the class due to our individual skill. I wanted to create a list and have a collaborative effort to identify all these handicaps that were given to us simply because we excelled with the class and knew how to use the class to its best extent. I also wanted to identify those skills/traits that Anet deemed to be over performing because other players didn’t know how to deal with them/us, which at the root of Thief and it’s actual problem, wasn’t the problem or atleast all of the problem.

Thief:

- Stealth attacks now have a 1s ICD if missed

- Backstab co-efficient nerfed multiple times

- Mug trait (Cannot crit anymore)

- Initiative increases

- Sw/X AA chain dmg nerfed

- Stealth uptime cut in half

- Marked debuff

- Added +1s to reveal debuff in PvP 

- Traps got killed because of an over performing rune and changed to a worse system, (preparations)

(Trust me there’s ALOT more for base Thief, but I’ll give you guys an opportunity to add to the list)

 

Daredevil:

- Exhaustion Debuff

- Pulmonary Impact substantial dmg nerf

- Staff initiative increases 

- initiative increases for staff in general

- Vault dmg nerf

- Unable to vault on flat ground & swap weapons mid air (can still do this while on an inclined hill tho)

( You guys can add more as you think of them)

 

Deadeye:

- Nerfed Silent Scope

- Cursed Bullet stealth attack change

- Deaths Judgement dmg nerf

- initiative increases

- Deadeyes old middle trait that offered (stun) on f1 removed and changed to (payback)

(Add more as you think)

Specter:

- Consume Shadows nerf/rework

- Shroud nerf

- Endless night change from 3 allies to 1

- Scepter 2 weapon skill being garbage throughout beta and final release

- Shroud 5 AoE circle got removed (I still think this to be FOR ME personally a buff, Just so people don’t know I am stunning them, but I am aware that the stun will go off for myself, Just need to be next to them and pressure)

- 3 less initiative when using specter

- Quickness removed from Sc/P

(Add more as you see fit)

 

Edited September 24, 2022 by AikijinX.6258

[Demonhead.7584]

I'm already teetering on leaving this game for good. Taking down shroud to 0.69xHP is more than a 50% nerf. It's such a key part of specter's sustain in wvw roaming. If they really go through with this shroud nerf, I'm going to pack up and not look back. It's very, very sad to see thief like this.

Edited September 21, 2022 by Demonhead.7584

[Burial.1958]

The thief nerfs are a nerverending story. That is because there are alot players who are toxic toward this class and not that many devs play this class really. I mean every decent soulbeast can roflstomp thief and pew pew from distance but it seems thats not a problem for Anet but keep nerfing the dmg for thief, lol.

Edited September 22, 2022 by Grebcol.5984

[Bern.9613]

Despite all the of power nerfs over the years, the one that pretty much killed off daredevil (entered game Oct 2015) for me was the introduction of physical supremacy (Apr 2019). It changed steal (1200 range) to swipe (600 range). And of course can't forget the vault nerfs. Of course power got hit but so did the interaction with quickness (Feb 2017) and, wait for it, damage will no longer occur when used with a shadow step (Dec 2018). Yes Virginia that includes using haste, swipe, infiltrator's signet, shadow step and quickness runes and sigils. 

 

Side note: I've noticed that there is a significant decrease in thief youtubes and well liked streamers streaming GW2 of late. GW2 was brought onto the market when having a stealth fighter, rogue/assassin/thief, on the battlefield was quintessential of all MMO's. Now there's a resurgence for "vanilla" or back to the beginning of MMO's including a reset of skills. I know that ANet would never, ever reset thief to what it was 10 yrs ago, their heads would explode.

[Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497]

22 hours ago, Demonhead.7584 said:

I'm already teetering on leaving this game for good. Taking down shroud to 0.69xHP is more than a 50% nerf. It's such a key part of specter's sustain in wvw roaming. If they really go through with this shroud nerf, I'm going to pack up and not look back. It's very, very sad to see thief like this.

Same. I'm actually near that point. I love the game. But its getting harder and harder to find the enthusiasm these days with how hard my profession is getting abused on a regular basis.

 

Last time I logged in was a week after the release of the expansion

Edited September 22, 2022 by Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497

[Doggie.3184]

Don't forget they buffed Pistols to 1050 Range and Gave them bouncy bullets through Ricochet, making it the most fun weapon in the entire game and instead of readjusting anything they 100% removed the entire exciting new feature. I'll never recover from that more than anything.

[Asur.9178]

I could make an entire list of things (would easily be over 8 pages long)...but, I've already basically checked out at this point after 10 years of supporting the game and dealing with the balance team's illogical changes over the years when it comes to Thief.

Supported this franchise for over 17 years (since GW1 betas), and frankly, though I was never truly happy about the complete 180 direction with Thief compared to Assassin (which was a significantly better class, with less whining from the average players because of no stealth), I did have some fun, but not enough to continue supporting these balance changes after over 10 years.

When an entire traitline is a problem for over 10 years and another for over 2.5 years and they don't do anything to address them, it's enough to make any sane person quit...which is what I claimed I would do months ago, and I intend to do it post the November profession update unless certain things change (which I don't see happening at the rate they are going):

Quote

If I do not see Acrobatics and Trickery in all gamemodes, and Sword in PvE being addressed for Thief in the mid-fall major professions update, I would not be surprised to find myself quitting the game. In particular, Acrobatics has been a dead traitline for over 2 years, while Trickery has been a problem for almost 10 years (will be 10 years by the time the next patch arrives). It's absolutely ridiculous that these long standing issues and problem areas are still not addressed.

They obviously do not want thief to be able to hold its own in a fair fight; so, uses its mobility to disengage (aka running away cause you lost) as an excuse to keep it neutered. They obviously want thief to just be a decap bot.

They would have been better off removing stealth from ALL classes' skills and traits and ONLY making it something accessible through combo finishing, instead of punishing the class as hard as they have over the years. In the year 2022, Thief's mobility isn't even a thing that should be considered for neutering it, considering EVERY SINGLE class has ridiculous mobility compared to 2012.

Edited September 22, 2022 by Asur.9178

[Graeaw.6329]

Power creep in general. Other classes possess standard easy to land skills with backstab-like damage coefficients but without the positioning requirement. Some of them are AoE skills even. Or ranged. Or both. Absolutely baffling to be honest.

[AikijinX.6258]

6 hours ago, Doggie.3184 said:

Don't forget they buffed Pistols to 1050 Range and Gave them bouncy bullets through Ricochet, making it the most fun weapon in the entire game and instead of readjusting anything they 100% removed the entire exciting new feature. I'll never recover from that more than anything.

Yet another example of a good thing we had going for Thief. But we over performed while using it, so they handicapped us. Very unfortunate. Richochet is one of those traits that will always be missed, no matter what year. And when DrD in general overperformed, they cut our steal distance. It’s actually nauseating to think about throughout the years how these ‘balances’ oppressed us.  Of course we adapted and still prevailed, but then they found another thing to ‘balance’ because of our adaptation. Regardless, for myself (and just speaking for myself) I know that I will always be okay in WvW or PvP and be able to confirm kills and 1vX, but that isn’t the same for new Thieves, or players that aren’t really Thief mains but always wanted to use this class because of the ‘fun’ of it. It’ll be a lot harder for people who aren’t well acquainted with this class, and that’s something I’m not okay with.

5 hours ago, Asur.9178 said:

I could make an entire list of things (would easily be over 8 pages long)...but, I've already basically checked out at this point after 10 years of supporting the game and dealing with the balance team's illogical changes over the years when it comes to Thief.

Supported this franchise for over 17 years (since GW1 betas), and frankly, though I was never truly happy about the complete 180 direction with Thief compared to Assassin (which was a significantly better class, with less whining from the average players because of no stealth), I did have some fun, but not enough to continue supporting these balance changes after over 10 years.

When an entire traitline is a problem for over 10 years and another for over 2.5 years and they don't do anything to address them, it's enough to make any sane person quit...which is what I claimed I would do months ago, and I intend to do it post the November profession update unless certain things change (which I don't see happening at the rate they are going):

They obviously do not want thief to be able to hold its own in a fair fight; so, uses its mobility to disengage (aka running away cause you lost) as an excuse to keep it neutered. They obviously want thief to just be a decap bot.

They would have been better off removing stealth from ALL classes' skills and traits and ONLY making it something accessible through combo finishing, instead of punishing the class as hard as they have over the years. In the year 2022, Thief's mobility isn't even a thing that should be considered for neutering it, considering EVERY SINGLE class has ridiculous mobility compared to 2012.

I totally understand your strife brother, and you’ve got every right to feel as such. It’s oppressing and not really motivating to come back. I’ve taken a hiatus from the game myself. I haven’t logged on in well over a month maybe close to 2. It’s just unfortunate the direction we continue to go as well as the lack of representation or urgency from this dev team. New players and players that don’t main thieves shouldn’t have to struggle as much and jump through hoops to get the bare minimum of what another class can produce with 1 skill, while also being able to generate good defensive boons and have a decent health pool. I’ve got a whole book worth of things I can say and express about the changes, how many changes have been done throughout the years, etc. But I won’t do that. It’s just really unfortunate that new players can’t fall in love with this class because of how poorly balanced this class has been. Which leads to decreased amounts of Thief representation, which then leads to less acknowledgment on the Reddits, which then makes it seems as though Thief is perfectly fine, or that we are just doing okay and that we’ll deal with whatever is thrown at us. Low representation and callouts on Reddit  just equals 0 eyes from Anet. (I’m always mentioning Reddit, because it’s already a known thing that this Thief forum, and in general each profession’s forum don’t really get much love from the devs, and it really doesn’t matter what we post here in regard to feedback, because almost none of it is taken into consideration)

[Bern.9613]

12 hours ago, AikijinX.6258 said:

I totally understand your strife brother, and you’ve got every right to feel as such. It’s oppressing and not really motivating to come back. I’ve taken a hiatus from the game myself. I haven’t logged on in well over a month maybe close to 2. It’s just unfortunate the direction we continue to go as well as the lack of representation or urgency from this dev team. New players and players that don’t main thieves shouldn’t have to struggle as much and jump through hoops to get the bare minimum of what another class can produce with 1 skill, while also being able to generate good defensive boons and have a decent health pool.

Funny you mention this. I haven't logged into wvw since end June. I did log in and took 3 new players (2 from steam) to EotM arena to show/teach them about core, DD and DE (I don't consider specter a real thief, just a wanna be weak necro). As of this writing, none of them use their thief anymore. All of them were being chased by groups of 3+ and dying too much. Two of them outright deleted their thief, the 3rd uses it for storage. For those doing research while trying to decide if thief is worth it, I'll leave this build with you. 

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PawAoqrlNw6YcMNGJeUXbNdA-zVIYbUyXGFEClWAufACYJ8SEMDAA-w

This build is good for roaming. It's an all or nothing, in yo face build with no real escape but has great damage and survivability. Just choose your point and time of engagement. Weapon swapping is part of the build. You could put both pistols on one hand and take out your short bow. Remember that 2 X cluster bomb (skill 2 on short bow) into black powder (skill 5 on pistol/pistol) and a bound will create a fair amount of stealth for escaping. Good luck out there.

[Jugglemonkey.8741]

The thing that baffles me at the moment is how much Anet fail to understand the base mechanics and trade offs of thief in general. I mean, they're putting all this effort to get shadow arts and acrobatics to work with specter and just failing spectacularly (at least, i hope the 300s trait changes are aimed at specter, if they were aimed at anything else they missed the playing field, never mind the goal).

New SA is great on daredevil and deadeye but removing the stealth access removed the only reason you'd consider running the line on specter. Even if they made acro amazing for specter they're ignoring the fact that because they have failed to deal with trickery being a mandatory pick (even making the issue worse with the trade off), and because they have nerfed damage to the point where you hit like a wet noodle if you dont take critical strikes or deadly arts, nobody is ever going to take shadow arts or acrobatics over trickery and a damage line. 

Echoing what others have said, i have hardly logged on in the last few months. I have over 8k hours on thief thief over the last 10 years, 11k ish hours total, and i have probably spent thousands in gems monthly over the years it was better for me given my shift pattern at work. I don't see myself playing or spending at all at the moment, and that's directly because the state of thief isn't as fun now compared to what it used to be. 

edit; if you want to see what i mean, try playing a sword thief vs a cele harbinger or ranger. See how tryhard you have to play to make a dent and how badly they can play and still win. I don't mind an uphill fight, i rather enjoy it, but if mechanics are constantly removed that people enjoy and make builds around then sooner or later you hit the point where its no longer fun. 

Edited September 23, 2022 by Jugglemonkey.8741

[cyberzombie.7348]

What a lot of people don't get about thief (core at least) is that by nature, it requires a very cerebral way of thinking to play effectively. Demanding situational awareness and planning  for both the surroundings and the targets before making a move, much like an assassin. All while weighing in your own limitations.

So to put it plainly, a smart thief is a good thief.

Edited September 24, 2022 by cyberzombie.7348

[AikijinX.6258]

9 hours ago, cyberzombie.7348 said:

What a lot of people don't get about thief (core at least) is that by nature, it requires a very cerebral way of thinking to play effectively. Demanding situational awareness and planning  for both the surroundings and the targets before making a move, much like an assassin. All while weighing in your own limitations.

So to put it plainly, a smart thief is a good thief.

There are thieves on these forums, myself included— who have played Thief since it’s inception. We understand all of what you said.

The problem at hand however is Anet making Thief a lot more difficult and not so user/class friendly for newer players or players that don’t main thieves. Also, when we just so happen to “play smart” we get punished for this and nerfed due to playing too smart and over performing with our mechanics/class. So over the years and many ‘balances’ patches, we’ve been handicapped… I could even argue that we just might be the one class that has received the most handicaps and punishments due to over performing and playing too well.

Edited September 24, 2022 by AikijinX.6258

[cyberzombie.7348]

@AikijinX.6258True, it also doesn't help that thief went through an identity crisis when Shiro herald became meta. Even now with willbender.

[DeceiverX.8361]

On 9/22/2022 at 9:29 AM, Bern.9613 said:

Despite all the of power nerfs over the years, the one that pretty much killed off daredevil (entered game Oct 2015) for me was the introduction of physical supremacy (Apr 2019). It changed steal (1200 range) to swipe (600 range). And of course can't forget the vault nerfs. Of course power got hit but so did the interaction with quickness (Feb 2017) and, wait for it, damage will no longer occur when used with a shadow step (Dec 2018). Yes Virginia that includes using haste, swipe, infiltrator's signet, shadow step and quickness runes and sigils. 

 

Side note: I've noticed that there is a significant decrease in thief youtubes and well liked streamers streaming GW2 of late. GW2 was brought onto the market when having a stealth fighter, rogue/assassin/thief, on the battlefield was quintessential of all MMO's. Now there's a resurgence for "vanilla" or back to the beginning of MMO's including a reset of skills. I know that ANet would never, ever reset thief to what it was 10 yrs ago, their heads would explode.

I hope they never reset to vanilla to be honest.  2014 just before the Specializations patch was the peak, and there were still issues.  But vanilla?  Even now is better than that...

Vanilla had the original Assassin's Signet and SA with Mug crits, and despite loving Signet thief, there's no reason for 15k damage Steal or 40k damage backstab, before boons and tank stats even really existed, either.

 

As far as the OP is concerned, a lot of these nerfs were due to fringe builds existing that featured low-no interactivity, in large part because of the defensive tools the class has, and a large part of this is because the class's interactions with core combat mechanics are based on the old trait design of yore where you either picked damage or sustain and not both.  With the full three trait lines, mathematically-superior gear, and elite specs which up until over-corrections have given a bit too much to everything, these mechanics start really breaking the game too much, which is why core is perpetually bad.

[kash.9213]

16 hours ago, Jugglemonkey.8741 said:

 

edit; if you want to see what i mean, try playing a sword thief vs a cele harbinger or ranger. See how tryhard you have to play to make a dent and how badly they can play and still win. I don't mind an uphill fight, i rather enjoy it, but if mechanics are constantly removed that people enjoy and make builds around then sooner or later you hit the point where its no longer fun. 

That's the point that Anet needs to really think ahead on. You can get to a point where a classic build can feel like all of your hits are falling half flat or like you can't even swing, like one of those derpy fights you might have in a bad dream. A lot of that has to do with them just stashing more balance into damage range and Initiative, like they don't know where else to put it.

One of my problems is, I really tune into the audio and visual feedback in this game and as stupid as it sounds I feel that crisp bite when I know my hits are passable or when I'm getting hit with something I need to take seriously. When that feeling is too labored because I can't keep messing with my stat thresholds too much, or when my terrain negotiation and animation combos feel suppressed, then it's hard to vibe. 

I still appreciate a lot about this class and it's mechanics and some aspects are way better or more appropriate than they've ever been, but then they still give mixed messages about what they want from us in any game mode.

[itspomf.9523]

23 hours ago, AikijinX.6258 said:

I could even argue that we just might be the one class that has received the most handicaps and punishments due to over performing and playing too well.

Downstate meta being turned into a meme by the new balance lead and the truly meta-defining Catalyst would like a word.

[AikijinX.6258]

45 minutes ago, itspomf.9523 said:

Downstate meta being turned into a meme by the new balance lead and the truly meta-defining Catalyst would like a word.

Yes I do not disagree or deny elementalist has had their fair share of problems. However, thief has had a problem with their class since it’s inception, because people don’t know how to deal with stealth, and definitely don’t know how to deal with thieves that know their mechanics and how to utilize them to an above average performance level. Historically I’m going out on a limb here and making an educated guess that we have had the most handicaps & punishments directed towards our profession in comparison to others.

Edited September 25, 2022 by AikijinX.6258

[Bern.9613]

8 hours ago, AikijinX.6258 said:

Yes I do not disagree or deny elementalist has had their fair share of problems. However, thief has had a problem with their class since it’s inception, because people don’t know how to deal with stealth, and definitely don’t know how to deal with thieves that know their mechanics and how to utilize them to an above average performance level. Historically I’m going out on a limb here and making an educated guess that we have had the most handicaps & punishments directed towards our profession in comparison to others.

I listed some but not all the nerfs at the beginning of the vid. The actual list is, as you are painfully aware, enormous.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDM3ZHASw1g

 

Edited September 25, 2022 by Bern.9613

[ZeroTheRuler.7415]

I agree. I think the hard part is the fact that the class is initiative based vs cooldown based. This makes balancing thief really tricky sigh. It is a double edged sword (you have to time things well vs just press things off of CD). If people get good at using those skills efficiently then things get nerfed and people whine OP. It is a lot easier to use CD skills lol.

Different nerfs raise the skill ceiling, but unfortunately at the same time also directly raises the skill floor for the rest of the players.

There are only a limited select few builds in PvP/WvW that flow for me and are fun. The rest have seemed awkward to use and so I never got into them.

@AikijinX.6258 you forgot invigorating precision nerfs 😮

Edited September 27, 2022 by ZeroTheRuler.7415

[Nema Tode.5637]

While it's easy to hate on Anet for their questionable decisions regarding thief balance, it's important to be careful about what we complain about because as an artifact of being a very unique class, thief is hard to balance and ends up with lots of things that are just too powerful, and to complain about their eventual nerfs as if they are comparable to the actual 0iq changes hurts our message and makes it harder for whoever is balancing thief to take us seriously. Good thieves can make hard things look easy, but they still can and will abuse broken things.

 

A lot of thief posts do this, but this one has a big list that I thought would be fun to give my thoughts on whether or not they deserved to be nerfed because they are powerful on their own, or if good thieves just make it look too powerful. I feel I should also mention I am a dedicated thief main myself, and while I think I am generally pretty reasonable, take the bias as you will.

 

>Stealth attacks now have 1s ICD if missed
I like how this is the very first thing mentioned because it is exactly what I was talking about above and hurts the message of posts like this. It's a perfect example of an excellent change because it rewards smart play from both parties. It gives opponents a way to meaningfully outplay thieves by predicting timing. Previously they were incentivized to just do nothing because anything defensive on their end was wasted owing to being able to spam stealth attacks. As an outcome of that, they will now usually try and do something, which rewards the thief for good timing by getting the hit on them in addition to having them waste their defensive skill. While it undeniably hurts thieves, it mostly only hurts those who just mindlessly spam their attacks, while at the same time rewarding enemies who do take the time to learn how to deal with thief, who previously couldn't do anything about it. Whoever came up with this change did a great job.

 

>Backstab co-efficient nerfed multiple times
I'm pretty sure backstab damage was actually only nerfed once as part of the universal damage nerfs in 2020, and given almost every skill in the game was nerfed in that update, it's not fair to mention it as a handicap for overperforming thieves. I agree it was nerfed too hard though.

 

>Mug trait (Cannot crit anymore)
This one is interesting because originally this trait was completely OP and anyone who thinks it shouldn't have been nerfed during its time is insane. That said, in today's powercrept climate, given the fact the base damage has been nerfed and how Deadly Arts for power specs is very underperforming, I think allowing it to crit may be a decent way to make the trait line competitive again, and also force anyone but core thieves to make a difficult decision about dropping one of the other overperforming lines.

 

>Initiative increases
This is mentioned multiple times in this post so I'm only going to cover it once. Generally, skills get increased init costs because they're too spammy when they shouldn't be. Pistol whip, black powder, unload, vault, three round burst, and twilight combo are good examples of skills that should be expensive because of how powerful they are on their own; you shouldn't be able to use skills like these more than twice in a row on any build. What I do agree with are skills that were increased only to nerf something specific, like infiltrator's arrow on shortbow. This was only meant to make dash daredevil a bit slower but hurt every other thief build in the process which I find unfair.

 

>Sw/X AA chain dmg nerfed
I agree this was nerfed because of good thieves making it look easy. Anyone in a position where getting whacked by Sw/X AA is the primary source of damage is in a l2p situation, and likewise any thief who can consitently land AA's on good players (especially sword AA's as they're pretty slow) is also doing a good job themselves.

 

>Stealth uptime cut in half
This is way too big of a topic to discuss here, but my stance is that being able to stealth camp is a bad thing, and I think the direction they are heading in rewarding spending less time in stealth instead rewarding more time in stealth is a good thing. Camping in stealth should have a cost like not getting any trait benefits rather than being just objectively the correct thing to do, since disregarding anything about balance, fighting somebody who is constantly invisible it just not fun. In that sense, I'm of the opinion that nerfs to stealth uptime (not application) are actually intended for the unskilled thieves who use it as a crutch.

 

>Marked debuff
I don't really have an opinion on this. If you don't want to get marked, just stay away from sentries and upgraded towers. If you do get marked, just don't stay stealthed for more than three seconds 4head.

 

>Added +1s to reveal debuff in PvP
This was added to all gamemodes shortly after release, and in fact only got changed for PvE, and at the time, PvE == WvW. This was indeed a change targeted toward good thieves, however in today's state of the class I think it ended up being a good thing and would not be opposed to bringing it to WvW as well.

 

>Traps got killed because of an over performing rune and changed to a worse system, (preparations)
Whether activation on command rather than impact is worse or not is largely subjective, since it gives you a way to activate the trap independently of an enemy, but obviously requires more thought. I'd classify this as a rework rather than a handicap. If we're just talking about semantics, then it's already been identified this was because of the rune, not the thief.

 

>Exhaustion Debuff
This is absolutely necessary. You can't just be immune to debilitating conditions for free. Other classes would kill for a trait like this even if all it did was remove the condis on dodge. Exhaustion gives some way to be worn down overtime, and doesn't prevent the plentiful other ways to restore endurance on daredevil.

 

>Pulmonary Impact substantial dmg nerf
This was even worse than OG mug in its hayday. Maybe I'm biased though because this trait is the sole reason I quit during the entirety of HoT. People would just melt while at the same time being unable to play the game, and all the thief had to do is spam 4, which was lame on both ends, a complete antithesis to "fun and interactive." I think it shouldn't have gotten nerfed to its laughable state today where havoc mastery just does more damage overall, but it had to be nerfed significantly.

 

>Vault dmg nerf
Same thing as backstab, this was nerfed in the 2020 universal damage nerf and therefore irrelevant to this post. In my personal opinion, an aoe skill that also evades should do a little less damage than a boosted backstab.

 

>Unable to vault on flat ground & swap weapons mid air (can still do this while on an inclined hill tho)
I'm pretty sure all skills that launch you into the air (not leaps like sword leaps) behave this way, it is not targeted to thief, nor would that be something anet would intentionally nerf either, since it would just be a question of whether or not that is intended behavior.

 

>Nerfed Silent Scope
This was nerfed for the same reason hidden thief was. 3 Seconds is way too much stealth given dodging costs zero initiative and cannot be interacted with.

 

>Cursed Bullet stealth attack change
It's not so much as a change as simply removing it in favor of gaining the smoke screen in slot 4 and death's judgement as a zero initiative stealth attack, both of which are also very powerful, making this subjective, not a handicap. I personally loved cursed bullet 🙂

 

>Deadeyes old middle trait that offered (stun) on f1 removed and changed to (payback)
Another subjective change. Both versions of this trait competed with silent scope which was and is overwhelmingly used and because of that, no matter what their intentions were with this change, it wouldn't have been to handicap thieves. I'd think they actually attempted to make payback compete with silent scope.

 

>Consume Shadows nerf/rework
I don't know what this is referring to since I'm pretty sure nothing has changed about this since release. Anything in beta doesn't count because it's a beta which is inherently subject to change and open to the players on that premise.

 

>Shroud nerf
I assume this is related to the upcoming health scaling. As it is now, I think it's too high, I'm pretty sure it's more than necro gets. cutting it by more than half is probably too much though.

 

>Endless night change from 3 allies to 1
This was always 1 ally. Beta doesn't count.

 

>Scepter 2 weapon skill being garbage
This is irrelevant because it was always bad, it wasn't made bad to handicap good thieves.

 

>Shroud 5 aoe circle got removed
I don't see how this can possibly be construed as a nerf, since it just makes it harder to react to it on the opponent's side. Any thief who would be handicapped by not seeing their own aoe circle (which their opponent also cannot) can in no way be considered a "good thief."

 

>3 less initiative when using specter
This is irrelevant because it was a conscious design choice from release to compensate for init-free shroud skills, it wasn't introduced to handicap good thieves.

 

>Quickness removed from Sc/P
I don't think endless night ever gave personal quickness, only to allies, which it still does. If it ever did, it was probably a beta bug.

 

>What do I actually think was nerfed just because of good players

A good example of something I think was unjustified was nerfs to s/d dual attacks. They're both decently hard to land, larcenous strike in particular being a melee attack with no active defense. These skills should be more powerful because they can only be used well by strong players in the first place owing to the conditions required to land, and were not powerful enough to be meta warping (such as something like origianal twilight combo), whereas most other meta thief builds get their primary damage from skills that are much easier to land and more powerful.

 

In general though, I think there's not a lot of unjustified changes for the sins of good thieves since at the end of the day, things that are inherently too strong are usually the things abused by such players, and for the things that are harder to use, it's not fair for top tier players to have to deal with bullkitten just because they can do things less experienced players can. People playing a hard class should be able to beat players of equal skill level who are on an easier build, but shouldn't be dominating (it shouldn't be as effective or worse than the easy builds though, which seems to be the direction balance is heading 😡.) I think Anet is actually pretty good at identifying things that need fixing when it comes to thief, but they just always mess up on their actual solution to that thing, whether it be fixing a symptom rather than the cause (looking at you, deception cds pre hidden thief nerf) or being way too extreme with the numbers (upcoming shroud health and pulmonary impact.)

 

[senftube.6081]

48 minutes ago, Nema Tode.5637 said:

 

>Backstab co-efficient nerfed multiple times
I'm pretty sure backstab damage was actually only nerfed once as part of the universal damage nerfs in 2020, and given almost every skill in the game was nerfed in that update, it's not fair to mention it as a handicap for overperforming thieves. I agree it was nerfed too hard though.

 

 

It was nerfed since RLS multiple times and not only since 2020.

 

48 minutes ago, Nema Tode.5637 said:

W

 

>Initiative increases
This is mentioned multiple times in this post so I'm only going to cover it once. Generally, skills get increased init costs because they're too spammy when they shouldn't be. Pistol whip, black powder, unload, vault, three round burst, and twilight combo are good examples of skills that should be expensive because of how powerful they are on their own; you shouldn't be able to use skills like these more than twice in a row on any build. What I do agree with are skills that were increased only to nerf something specific, like infiltrator's arrow on shortbow. This was only meant to make dash daredevil a bit slower but hurt every other thief build in the process which I find unfair.

 

 

 

Nope it is not good because it kills the gameplay flow. Ini is a global Cooldown and it did make thief slower and slower. It is now in State where you often have 0 Ini and did not that much dmg. When u have 0 you are a ded duck then. Biggest problem is, that without the traitline trickery, the thief isn't even playable outside of spectre. The costs are to high or they have to make prepardness baseline. So that the player can choose an othe traitline than trickery.

 

48 minutes ago, Nema Tode.5637 said:

 

>Marked debuff
I don't really have an opinion on this. If you don't want to get marked, just stay away from sentries and upgraded towers. If you do get marked, just don't stay stealthed for more than three seconds 4head.

 

 

 

 

This debuff is the unfairest kitten in this game. No other class has such a unfair debuff. It kills your defensive and offensive simultaneously. It is also bad when u want to fight in a tower with watchtower. I mean how would it be for other classes when their blocks, invul or boons would get a debuff? xD

They should simply lower the duration or make it so that u can get the debuff twice but with an end. It's pretty toxic towards this class when u have to wait outside when your zerg attacks the tower because u would be a rallybot. No other classes has a debuff in form of NPC's or Structures which target your offensive and defensive!

48 minutes ago, Nema Tode.5637 said:

 

>Added +1s to reveal debuff in PvP
This was added to all gamemodes shortly after release, and in fact only got changed for PvE, and at the time, PvE == WvW. This was indeed a change targeted toward good thieves, however in today's state of the class I think it ended up being a good thing and would not be opposed to bringing it to WvW as well.

 

 

 

Really bad idea. Even more passiv Debuffs and only for thief. Sure....when is the debuff coming for boons or invul,blocks, reflects etc.? 😉

 

48 minutes ago, Nema Tode.5637 said:

 

>Vault dmg nerf
Same thing as backstab, this was nerfed in the 2020 universal damage nerf and therefore irrelevant to this post. In my personal opinion, an aoe skill that also evades should do a little less damage than a boosted backstab.

 

 

 

God i miss Vault/Steal combo...ye ye that was also nerfed.

48 minutes ago, Nema Tode.5637 said:

 

>What do I actually think was nerfed just because of good players

A good example of something I think was unjustified was nerfs to s/d dual attacks. They're both decently hard to land, larcenous strike in particular being a melee attack with no active defense. These skills should be more powerful because they can only be used well by strong players in the first place owing to the conditions required to land, and were not powerful enough to be meta warping (such as something like origianal twilight combo), whereas most other meta thief builds get their primary damage from skills that are much easier to land and more powerful.

 

In general though, I think there's not a lot of unjustified changes for the sins of good thieves since at the end of the day, things that are inherently too strong are usually the things abused by such players, and for the things that are harder to use, it's not fair for top tier players to have to deal with bullkitten just because they can do things less experienced players can. People playing a hard class should be able to beat players of equal skill level who are on an easier build, but shouldn't be dominating (it shouldn't be as effective or worse than the easy builds though, which seems to be the direction balance is heading 😡.) I think Anet is actually pretty good at identifying things that need fixing when it comes to thief, but they just always mess up on their actual solution to that thing, whether it be fixing a symptom rather than the cause (looking at you, deception cds pre hidden thief nerf) or being way too extreme with the numbers (upcoming shroud health and pulmonary impact.)

 

So because of 0,1 % of players a entire class should be nerfed to the ground.

Edited October 4, 2022 by Yunari.9065

[kash.9213]

16 hours ago, Nema Tode.5637 said:

While it's easy to hate on Anet for their questionable decisions regarding thief balance, it's important to be careful about what we complain about because as an artifact of being a very unique class, thief is hard to balance and ends up with lots of things that are just too powerful, and to complain about their eventual nerfs as if they are comparable to the actual 0iq changes hurts our message and makes it harder for whoever is balancing thief to take us seriously. Good thieves can make hard things look easy, but they still can and will abuse broken things.

 

A lot of thief posts do this, but this one has a big list that I thought would be fun to give my thoughts on whether or not they deserved to be nerfed because they are powerful on their own, or if good thieves just make it look too powerful. I feel I should also mention I am a dedicated thief main myself, and while I think I am generally pretty reasonable, take the bias as you will.

 

>Stealth attacks now have 1s ICD if missed
I like how this is the very first thing mentioned because it is exactly what I was talking about above and hurts the message of posts like this. It's a perfect example of an excellent change because it rewards smart play from both parties. It gives opponents a way to meaningfully outplay thieves by predicting timing. Previously they were incentivized to just do nothing because anything defensive on their end was wasted owing to being able to spam stealth attacks. As an outcome of that, they will now usually try and do something, which rewards the thief for good timing by getting the hit on them in addition to having them waste their defensive skill. While it undeniably hurts thieves, it mostly only hurts those who just mindlessly spam their attacks, while at the same time rewarding enemies who do take the time to learn how to deal with thief, who previously couldn't do anything about it. Whoever came up with this change did a great job.

 

>Backstab co-efficient nerfed multiple times
I'm pretty sure backstab damage was actually only nerfed once as part of the universal damage nerfs in 2020, and given almost every skill in the game was nerfed in that update, it's not fair to mention it as a handicap for overperforming thieves. I agree it was nerfed too hard though.

 

>Mug trait (Cannot crit anymore)
This one is interesting because originally this trait was completely OP and anyone who thinks it shouldn't have been nerfed during its time is insane. That said, in today's powercrept climate, given the fact the base damage has been nerfed and how Deadly Arts for power specs is very underperforming, I think allowing it to crit may be a decent way to make the trait line competitive again, and also force anyone but core thieves to make a difficult decision about dropping one of the other overperforming lines.

 

>Initiative increases
This is mentioned multiple times in this post so I'm only going to cover it once. Generally, skills get increased init costs because they're too spammy when they shouldn't be. Pistol whip, black powder, unload, vault, three round burst, and twilight combo are good examples of skills that should be expensive because of how powerful they are on their own; you shouldn't be able to use skills like these more than twice in a row on any build. What I do agree with are skills that were increased only to nerf something specific, like infiltrator's arrow on shortbow. This was only meant to make dash daredevil a bit slower but hurt every other thief build in the process which I find unfair.

 

>Sw/X AA chain dmg nerfed
I agree this was nerfed because of good thieves making it look easy. Anyone in a position where getting whacked by Sw/X AA is the primary source of damage is in a l2p situation, and likewise any thief who can consitently land AA's on good players (especially sword AA's as they're pretty slow) is also doing a good job themselves.

 

>Stealth uptime cut in half
This is way too big of a topic to discuss here, but my stance is that being able to stealth camp is a bad thing, and I think the direction they are heading in rewarding spending less time in stealth instead rewarding more time in stealth is a good thing. Camping in stealth should have a cost like not getting any trait benefits rather than being just objectively the correct thing to do, since disregarding anything about balance, fighting somebody who is constantly invisible it just not fun. In that sense, I'm of the opinion that nerfs to stealth uptime (not application) are actually intended for the unskilled thieves who use it as a crutch.

 

>Marked debuff
I don't really have an opinion on this. If you don't want to get marked, just stay away from sentries and upgraded towers. If you do get marked, just don't stay stealthed for more than three seconds 4head.

 

>Added +1s to reveal debuff in PvP
This was added to all gamemodes shortly after release, and in fact only got changed for PvE, and at the time, PvE == WvW. This was indeed a change targeted toward good thieves, however in today's state of the class I think it ended up being a good thing and would not be opposed to bringing it to WvW as well.

 

>Traps got killed because of an over performing rune and changed to a worse system, (preparations)
Whether activation on command rather than impact is worse or not is largely subjective, since it gives you a way to activate the trap independently of an enemy, but obviously requires more thought. I'd classify this as a rework rather than a handicap. If we're just talking about semantics, then it's already been identified this was because of the rune, not the thief.

 

>Exhaustion Debuff
This is absolutely necessary. You can't just be immune to debilitating conditions for free. Other classes would kill for a trait like this even if all it did was remove the condis on dodge. Exhaustion gives some way to be worn down overtime, and doesn't prevent the plentiful other ways to restore endurance on daredevil.

 

>Pulmonary Impact substantial dmg nerf
This was even worse than OG mug in its hayday. Maybe I'm biased though because this trait is the sole reason I quit during the entirety of HoT. People would just melt while at the same time being unable to play the game, and all the thief had to do is spam 4, which was lame on both ends, a complete antithesis to "fun and interactive." I think it shouldn't have gotten nerfed to its laughable state today where havoc mastery just does more damage overall, but it had to be nerfed significantly.

 

>Vault dmg nerf
Same thing as backstab, this was nerfed in the 2020 universal damage nerf and therefore irrelevant to this post. In my personal opinion, an aoe skill that also evades should do a little less damage than a boosted backstab.

 

>Unable to vault on flat ground & swap weapons mid air (can still do this while on an inclined hill tho)
I'm pretty sure all skills that launch you into the air (not leaps like sword leaps) behave this way, it is not targeted to thief, nor would that be something anet would intentionally nerf either, since it would just be a question of whether or not that is intended behavior.

 

>Nerfed Silent Scope
This was nerfed for the same reason hidden thief was. 3 Seconds is way too much stealth given dodging costs zero initiative and cannot be interacted with.

 

>Cursed Bullet stealth attack change
It's not so much as a change as simply removing it in favor of gaining the smoke screen in slot 4 and death's judgement as a zero initiative stealth attack, both of which are also very powerful, making this subjective, not a handicap. I personally loved cursed bullet 🙂

 

>Deadeyes old middle trait that offered (stun) on f1 removed and changed to (payback)
Another subjective change. Both versions of this trait competed with silent scope which was and is overwhelmingly used and because of that, no matter what their intentions were with this change, it wouldn't have been to handicap thieves. I'd think they actually attempted to make payback compete with silent scope.

 

>Consume Shadows nerf/rework
I don't know what this is referring to since I'm pretty sure nothing has changed about this since release. Anything in beta doesn't count because it's a beta which is inherently subject to change and open to the players on that premise.

 

>Shroud nerf
I assume this is related to the upcoming health scaling. As it is now, I think it's too high, I'm pretty sure it's more than necro gets. cutting it by more than half is probably too much though.

 

>Endless night change from 3 allies to 1
This was always 1 ally. Beta doesn't count.

 

>Scepter 2 weapon skill being garbage
This is irrelevant because it was always bad, it wasn't made bad to handicap good thieves.

 

>Shroud 5 aoe circle got removed
I don't see how this can possibly be construed as a nerf, since it just makes it harder to react to it on the opponent's side. Any thief who would be handicapped by not seeing their own aoe circle (which their opponent also cannot) can in no way be considered a "good thief."

 

>3 less initiative when using specter
This is irrelevant because it was a conscious design choice from release to compensate for init-free shroud skills, it wasn't introduced to handicap good thieves.

 

>Quickness removed from Sc/P
I don't think endless night ever gave personal quickness, only to allies, which it still does. If it ever did, it was probably a beta bug.

 

>What do I actually think was nerfed just because of good players

A good example of something I think was unjustified was nerfs to s/d dual attacks. They're both decently hard to land, larcenous strike in particular being a melee attack with no active defense. These skills should be more powerful because they can only be used well by strong players in the first place owing to the conditions required to land, and were not powerful enough to be meta warping (such as something like origianal twilight combo), whereas most other meta thief builds get their primary damage from skills that are much easier to land and more powerful.

 

In general though, I think there's not a lot of unjustified changes for the sins of good thieves since at the end of the day, things that are inherently too strong are usually the things abused by such players, and for the things that are harder to use, it's not fair for top tier players to have to deal with bullkitten just because they can do things less experienced players can. People playing a hard class should be able to beat players of equal skill level who are on an easier build, but shouldn't be dominating (it shouldn't be as effective or worse than the easy builds though, which seems to be the direction balance is heading 😡.) I think Anet is actually pretty good at identifying things that need fixing when it comes to thief, but they just always mess up on their actual solution to that thing, whether it be fixing a symptom rather than the cause (looking at you, deception cds pre hidden thief nerf) or being way too extreme with the numbers (upcoming shroud health and pulmonary impact.)

 

A lot of weird takes and like half of them no one is bothered about.

There is only so much Initiative you can use and you need to trait for it on top of that. It can't be used to spam anything, unless using something two times or maybe three before having to replenish a resource pool is spamming. Adjust range or decide on what modifiers a skill should have or not. Pricing a skill out from being used doesn't balance anything, that's just a handicap to other players. 

[Bern.9613]

I started playing thief 10 yrs ago. I have adapted and overcame all their "reworks". Thief in general is hard to learn and even harder to sustain in this day and age where almost every class except thief has a reveal, target painters and traps and of course watch towers and sentries. I have taken the time to teach others to play thief and honestly maybe 5% get it and stick to it. It's always the same, hard to sustain, too many zergs chase me around, too many throwing target painters, etc, etc, etc.

For me, the final straw was 28 June and the disemboweling of SA. They "reworked" what we already had for small gains entering or exiting stealth and greatly diminishing the longevity of stealth. Essentially they urinated on the thief and try to convince us it was raining. The signs were there. We should have seen them for what they were. Specter was introduced with 3 less initiative from the get go and as a wanna-be necro. And now they've pushed even harder because some wanted to keep playing thief so they planned, adapted and overcame. The reward........

[AikijinX.6258]

Welp, at-least now it looks like the Thief community is finally speaking out here on the forums as well as Reddit. I say good job to that 😊 keep it up. We need better representation and voices, being we are among the lowest played class in the game.

Edited October 6, 2022 by AikijinX.6258