Thief CORE Mechanics are TOO GOOD in Competitive Modes

[Svarty.8019]

All variations of Thief are hard to play well. I acknowledge that fact. It's a blessing that there are only a few who can master this abomination of design, but when they do, holy smokes, it's incredible - it's no accident that the most impressive and outrageous roaming videos are made by thief players.

 

It's been clear since way back in the day that an average thief can outperform anything else in competitive modes. Come on. It's time to change the core mechanic to something sensible, get rid of the idea that it's fine to have ..well... everything on a single class and without cooldowns. 

 

 

Please understand that I'm not just asking for nerfs. I'm asking for a rework. Make things more balanced, let's see some LEVELLING UP!

 

[Gehenna.3625]

I don't even try to kill thieves in WvW, I mean ok, I will try until they stealth out and that's the sign for me to leave. They can stealth at will and get 500 km away from me in one second flat (yeah yeah an exaggeration but you get my point). I'm sure there are people  who can kill them but for me (as a guardian) it's pointless to try. Maybe it's me, I'm not that great at fighting other players, I mean I do a decent job but not great. It's just that with thieves or deadeyes or whichever variety, it's like what's the point?

I mean whenever I get one down to half health or near it, they just stealth out and run away and there's nothing I can do about that. Especially at supply camps. What am I gonna do? Wait there until they show again to do the same dance? Waste of time, my participation clock is still ticking.

But this is an issue with all games that have stealth classes that can stealth out of combat. And for some reason (unbeknownst to me), when they have this incredible power of stealth, game makers see fit to give them crazy mobility as well.  There must be some cosmic joke behind all of this, that I just don't get. /shrug

Edited September 24, 2022 by Gehenna.3625

[Ashen.2907]

I am not fond, in any game, of classes designed or balanced around attacking foes who are unaware of their presence. Its like a sniper in the rafters firing into a boxing ring, sure he "wins," but how much of an actual fight was it?

[itspomf.9523]

3 hours ago, Gehenna.3625 said:

And for some reason (unbeknownst to me), when they have this incredible power of stealth, game makers see fit to give them crazy mobility as well.

That's because Thief has the lowest health pool and medium armor, whiiiiiiiiich doesn't amount for much.

In fact, their defenses consist almost exclusively of:  dodging, stealth, blind, and ... well, that's about it.  Aside from shadowstepping elsewhere (provided a large pebble doesn't break their path to the target; those things are absolutely killer to step on, you know).

The reason fighting a thief is annoying is because their only defenses run counter to what everyone else wants out of a fight, and they're just getting pushed even farther into that corner.

3 hours ago, Svarty.8019 said:

I'm asking for a rework. Make things more balanced, let's see some LEVELLING UP!

Well, venoms got severely impacted over the years, Traps were removed wholesale for Preparations because of a single interaction with Runes of the Trapper (but then made almost baseline thanks to the new Shadow Arts reworks), Initiative costs are almost always ever-increasing (just ask Shortbow users -- in fact, shortbow itself was recently reworked:  Trick Shot in Sep. 2020 vs. May 2021), it took a recent patch to buff Staff on Daredevil to be on par with other elites, that same patch to improve Dagger and Sword, and the upcoming October 4th competitive rebalance will see Acrobatics and Specter largely gutted, even after the Acrobatics traitline was infamously taken out behind the shed to pave the way for Daredevil (reddit link).

There's probably a ton more stuff that I've forgotten or simply wasn't playing for (it has been a decade), but in terms of "balance" and "reworks," there have been a lot.

[Leger.3724]

23 hours ago, Gehenna.3625 said:

I don't even try to kill thieves in WvW, I mean ok, I will try until they stealth out and that's the sign for me to leave. They can stealth at will and get 500 km away from me in one second flat (yeah yeah an exaggeration but you get my point). I'm sure there are people  who can kill them but for me (as a guardian) it's pointless to try. Maybe it's me, I'm not that great at fighting other players, I mean I do a decent job but not great. It's just that with thieves or deadeyes or whichever variety, it's like what's the point?

I mean whenever I get one down to half health or near it, they just stealth out and run away and there's nothing I can do about that. Especially at supply camps. What am I gonna do? Wait there until they show again to do the same dance? Waste of time, my participation clock is still ticking.

But this is an issue with all games that have stealth classes that can stealth out of combat. And for some reason (unbeknownst to me), when they have this incredible power of stealth, game makers see fit to give them crazy mobility as well.  There must be some cosmic joke behind all of this, that I just don't get. /shrug

 

When making GW3 Arena Net should read opinions like this very carefully if they want PvP to be successful. 

 

The PvP is bad and not-rewarding as this player has experienced with thieves and mesmers simply running away whenever they come out on the wrong side of a trade. There is a reason positioning matters in most other games and any repositioning skills have extremely long cooldowns or significant drawbacks. The goal is to reward a player for outplaying another. The goal is to make interactions matter. Make mistakes matter.

 

Understand nobody is playing your pvp because it's unrewarding and also plain bad, it's not balanced particularly well because of its complexity, mechanics are clunky.

 

If your goal is to have good pvp in your next game take a long hard look at the games people actually play. They have longer cooldowns, fewer skills and things like positioning really matter. Certain "professions" have certain roles and the games are not afraid to shy away from that. Let the playerbase break the mould, don't break it yourself to create something nobody wants or wants to play.

 

 

[Svarty.8019]

23 hours ago, itspomf.9523 said:

There's probably a ton more stuff that I've forgotten or simply wasn't playing for (it has been a decade), but in terms of "balance" and "reworks," there have been a lot.

Why do you think there have been so many tweaks and attempts at balance? I'll give you a clue: it's the title of the thread.

 

Did you even read my original post?

 

I don't want tweaks around the edges, or nerfs.

 

I would like to see changes to the CORE mechanics. I'll repeat that in case you missed it again, the CORE mechanics of the Thief are too powerful in competitive modes. Not some peripheral stuff like venoms or any of that other guff.

 

I'll spell it out: The Core thief mechanics are;

1. No Cooldowns, "Initiative" instead

2. Stealth

3. Shadowstep

The combination of these things is too strong in competitive modes. I would like to see one or more of them replaced with something else.

 

I do not want not NERFS, nor dismantling of the class. I would like to see something as interesting as the current mechanics, but different.

 

[Sobx.1758]

4 minutes ago, Svarty.8019 said:

Why do you think there have been so many tweaks and attempts at balance? I'll give you a clue: it's the title of the thread.

 

Did you even read my original post?

 

I don't want tweaks around the edges, or nerfs.

 

I would like to see changes to the CORE mechanics. I'll repeat that in case you missed it again, the CORE mechanics of the Thief are too powerful in competitive modes. Not some peripheral stuff like venoms or any of that other guff.

 

I'll spell it out: The Core thief mechanics are;

1. No Cooldowns, "Initiative" instead

2. Stealth

3. Shadowstep

The combination of these things is too strong in competitive modes. I would like to see one or more of them replaced with something else.

 

I do not want not NERFS, nor dismantling of the class. I would like to see something as interesting as the current mechanics, but different.

Stealth isn't "thief mechanic". And neither is shadowstep. https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Shadowstep_(mechanic)

Edited September 25, 2022 by Sobx.1758

[Leger.3724]

2 hours ago, Svarty.8019 said:

I would like to see changes to the CORE mechanics. I'll repeat that in case you missed it again, the CORE mechanics of the Thief are too powerful in competitive modes. Not some peripheral stuff like venoms or any of that other guff

 

 

I think we need to face facts here: you want major changes. That's never happening.

 

The only people left in pvp are the people too afraid to leave for the big boys like League of Legends or DOTA 2. And they are terrified of any significant change that might bring people back and foster a competitive environment.

 

And then there's the 99%, the people who pve and don't want Arena Net tinkering with elite class specializations that make it super easy to spam a billion conditions or block, teleport, immune and snare all with one build. And they also don't want Arena Net spending a ton of time on changing it for pvp. And even if they were okay with that... we then run into the problem of pve and pvp being so different that nobody will want to try pvp. The goal should be to have pve and pvp be as similar as possible like say the early days of guild wars 1. Where necessary tone up or down on some skills but by and large things should feel similar.

 

Anyways the only real "fix" here is to wait for GW3 where hopefully Arena Net takes lessons to heart surrounding the complexity, the number of skills available to individual players, the expansions and how they destroyed any hope of pvp being good via elite specializations that simply gave more BS mechanics to more classes.

[Antycypator.9874]

On 9/24/2022 at 11:08 PM, Ashen.2907 said:

sure he "wins," but how much of an actual fight was it?

Win is win. Some people just go for a kill, not fight, especialy if you get exactly the same reward no matter what.

[Doggie.3184]

I'd be fine for a redesign cuz at this point having skills like "Maul" with a 3 second cooldown feels more appealing than global cooldown ini and the mega-refusal of AoE. Delete stealth from entire game from all classes and give me block/heavier-evade spam Assassin from GW1 XD

Absolutly never happening in all these forms though but sure.

[AikijinX.6258]

I’m not sure if this posts intention was to try to sway, derail, or mislead the public perception. 

But my friend, this is disingenuous to new players wanting to dip their feet into this class and try it out. You are correct in the sense when saying the good players you see on YouTube are typically above average Thieves, however despite the new player experience, these higher scaled thieves have had thousands of hours worth of experience. 

We do not have access to everything, and the things we do have access to are mediocre at best. Everyone else does an aspect of our class better. And our “no CDs” just isn’t a thing. We have global CDs on our skills due to the initiative system, and with the incredibly high increases to initiative costs on weapon skill, this also is a misrepresentation of our class and it’s abilities.

Edited September 26, 2022 by AikijinX.6258

[Vismooth.4128]

As cool and unique initiative system is, I really don't mind if it was scrapped for cooldowns instead.
But scrapping that means reworking every weapon and every trait that interacts with it currently. It'd simply be way too much work for current Anet to justify pouring dev cycles into.
A shame, really. I feel like cooldown-based thief would've been far more cohesive and functional than what we have now.

[Kolly.9872]

Omg again this topic in 2022.

After 10 years it is still a l2p issue to me...

[kash.9213]

14 minutes ago, Vismooth.4128 said:

As cool and unique initiative system is, I really don't mind if it was scrapped for cooldowns instead.
But scrapping that means reworking every weapon and every trait that interacts with it currently. It'd simply be way too much work for current Anet to justify pouring dev cycles into.
A shame, really. I feel like cooldown-based thief would've been far more cohesive and functional than what we have now.

Keep Initiative. Cooldowns would kitten the thief.

[Burial.1958]

1 hour ago, kash.9213 said:

Keep Initiative. Cooldowns would kitten the thief.

Ini is a global Cooldown system. So technical thief has cooldowns :P.

 

1 hour ago, Kolly.9872 said:

Omg again this topic in 2022.

After 10 years it is still a l2p issue to me...

 Ye, it is the same as usual.  The whining is pretty strong in Gw 2 community and it is pretty fun to see such topics about thief when there are other even more broken things in the game. Thief is fine atm and could even need some buffs expecially on unused weaponsets/traitlines.

Edited September 26, 2022 by Grebcol.5984

[itspomf.9523]

On 9/25/2022 at 7:32 PM, Svarty.8019 said:

I would like to see something as interesting as the current mechanics, but different.

So what you mean to say is you don't want thief to exist anymore.  Okay, that's fine, but considering it has been literally ten years, I'm afraid you're asking for the wrong thing.  And please, there's no need to get so defensive over it.

In fact, I'd recommend changing your post's title to "INITIATIVE, STEALTH, and SHADOWSTEPS are TOO GOOD in competitive modes," since, well ... that seems to be what you're really complaining about rather than "reworking" core thief for the hundredth time.

[kash.9213]

7 hours ago, Grebcol.5984 said:

Ini is a global Cooldown system. So technical thief has cooldowns :P.

 

 Ye, it is the same as usual.  The whining is pretty strong in Gw 2 community and it is pretty fun to see such topics about thief when there are other even more broken things in the game. Thief is fine atm and could even need some buffs expecially on unused weaponsets/traitlines.

But right now I can double Flanking Strike out of something. Wouldn't cooldowns only give me one? Or maybe I'm understanding the topic wrong. 

Edited September 27, 2022 by kash.9213

[Vismooth.4128]

1 hour ago, kash.9213 said:

But right now I can double Flanking Strike out of something. Wouldn't cooldowns only give me one? Or maybe I'm understanding the topic wrong. 

If Thief was changed to be a cd-based class, flanking strike wouldn't exist in the same iteration it is now, that's the whole point.
No one's saying "move initiative to cds and keep the skills the same", it would necessitate a complete rework of every weapon skill and trait that had to do with it, like I stated in my original message. Which is also why it'll never happen. Thing is, even if you moved thief to cds, kept it mostly the same, but gave it, like, multiple ammo stacks for certain relevant skills, it still would've worked better this way, at least I think so.
And correct me if I'm wrong on this, but Alacrity boon doesn't affect initiative gain in any way either.

[senftube.6081]

On 9/24/2022 at 10:43 PM, Svarty.8019 said:

It's a blessing that there are only a few who can master this abomination of design, but when they do, holy smokes, it's incredible

 

You provide your own answer. Maybe these players are simply better than you and would pick you apart at every class. In addition, I find it cringe when people who don't even play this class demand that their mechanics be completely changed because they seem unable to counter them and have an aversion to them.

In addition, the initiative is a global cooldown, so the statement that the thief has no cooldowns is simply not true.

Certainly not a class is completely changed so that Svarty is then satisfied. You are now quite known to constantly rail against this class.

The thief is in a good spot by now and pretty sure better balanced than a mech with 1 spamm and random AI mech dmg spreading with backstab coefficients without having to do anything at all.

 

Edited September 27, 2022 by Yunari.9065

[nopoet.2960]

I don't know, the damage numbers would have to be scary big if they got rid of the initiative system.  I think the devs have worked in that we can spam abilities multiple times.  Op be careful what you ask for.

[Emolesbian.3170]

Please play thief for a few months and learn from it:

 

- Burst damage...:

1. It is terrible. Ofc they needed the nerfs. Prime thieves with Assassin's signet, Backstab, mug crit, steal stealth were a plague in WvW. Burst enough to OS whoever came by them. Now if a thief fails his burst, he's nothing but a free kill. In comparison some classes can output litteraly the same level of damage on a more regular rate and minimum effort. If a thief init a fight and fails at it, he's chance to score the kill are near zero AND...that's why they shadowstep away.

 

- And shadowsteps...:

1.  Util. has 50s CD and action's window is 15s once activated <- This is an important countdown to keep in mind.
2.  Same window for Infiltrator Strike which is a point A to point B skill so you have to keep in mind the flow of the skill + starting/return point to plan a safe escape route.
3. Infiltrator Arrow and its huge init cost (8) speaks for itself.
4. Infiltrator Signet ? Who use it ? Signet of Agility is still better for Stamina recharge and Condi cleanse because Condi is thieves nemesis. Even more since Shadow Arts cleanse over time is gone.

 

- Init cost:

1. Most effective thief skills has their init cost pumped to the brim over and over. Now we have to make a choice to use them or not as it could leave us with an empty init bar. Take a look at Infiltrator Arrow and it's wtf 8 init cost. Please keep in mind that init bar total is 15 points with trickery. With many skills pinned to ~6 init cost, needless to say that 15 points melt pretty quickly if you don't play cautiously.

 

- Stealth:

1. Well man...Core thief has hmmm...Blinding Powder and Shadow Refuge. Running both is a not super useful and Shadow Refuge is not ideal as ppl can AoE the area to kitten you up before you move. So Blinding powder is the winner. On a 40s CD *wink*.
2. Cloack and dagger. But you need dagger OH and hit your target at melee range.
3. Black Powder/Heartseeker combo ? Remember the init cost ? Doing one combo cost 9 init. +3 for each subsequent Heartseeker. What will you do if you empty your init bar ? NOTHING...You're Infiltrator Arrow is kittened at the first combo (cost 8 ) if you want to secure an escape route. You're best bet is Shadowstep util...I hope you plan to use it well or waste it...
4. With reworked Shadow Arts thieves don't recover init over time anymore while in stealth and are now limited to 3 points. And if you wasted all your init in leap combo. What will you do with 3 points when the revealed debuff will come ? lol.
5. Stealth on Steal is gone.
6. Stealth on Heal is gone.
7. Trait to increase Stealth duration is gone. Now Normalized to 3s.
8. WvW structures can reveal.

- Ridiculous HP pool. Poor defense. 

- Blind is very useful against Rapid Fire and friends.

 

...And I'm tired to keep going. Thief ? cheesy? yes it was, years ago. Now the level of awareness required on your mechanics, the terrain you are fighting on, the remaining CDs on your util. , the maths to keep your init bar running, your position for in/out...there are so many parameters to constantly keep in mind to play a thief decently.

 

Thief needed nerfs here and there ofc. They had dozens of them for the last years and once again, many of them were deserved. And people still complain about how good it is ? As it goes, this class will turn into a kittening nobody one day and they'll still be there saying thief is too good.

(Feel free to correct me. Kinda nodding off lol).

Edited September 27, 2022 by Emolesbian.3170

[Dr Meta.3158]

Balance aside, the main things are

1. Thief isn't fun to fight against.

2. Thief's design encourages harassment and toxic behavior and usually attracts more of the toxic playerbase to it.

3. Because of 1 and 2, Thief is one of many core factors that keeps pvp/roaming populations low.

I do have to say, things have been worse. Remember deadeye when path of fire first launched? 

[Asahi.1487]

On 9/25/2022 at 2:00 PM, Leger.3724 said:

 

When making GW3 Arena Net should read opinions like this very carefully if they want PvP to be successful. 

 

The PvP is bad and not-rewarding as this player has experienced with thieves and mesmers simply running away whenever they come out on the wrong side of a trade. There is a reason positioning matters in most other games and any repositioning skills have extremely long cooldowns or significant drawbacks. The goal is to reward a player for outplaying another. The goal is to make interactions matter. Make mistakes matter.

 

Understand nobody is playing your pvp because it's unrewarding and also plain bad, it's not balanced particularly well because of its complexity, mechanics are clunky.

 

If your goal is to have good pvp in your next game take a long hard look at the games people actually play. They have longer cooldowns, fewer skills and things like positioning really matter. Certain "professions" have certain roles and the games are not afraid to shy away from that. Let the playerbase break the mould, don't break it yourself to create something nobody wants or wants to play.

 

 

Yep don't understand why they didn't bring over or adapt the successful pvp modes from gw1. Gw2 pvp is a complete joke

[kash.9213]

10 hours ago, Vismooth.4128 said:

If Thief was changed to be a cd-based class, flanking strike wouldn't exist in the same iteration it is now, that's the whole point.
No one's saying "move initiative to cds and keep the skills the same", it would necessitate a complete rework of every weapon skill and trait that had to do with it, like I stated in my original message. Which is also why it'll never happen. Thing is, even if you moved thief to cds, kept it mostly the same, but gave it, like, multiple ammo stacks for certain relevant skills, it still would've worked better this way, at least I think so.
And correct me if I'm wrong on this, but Alacrity boon doesn't affect initiative gain in any way either.

Then my first point still stands.

[Squeesidhe.4761]

On 9/24/2022 at 2:43 PM, Svarty.8019 said:

All variations of Thief are hard to play well. I acknowledge that fact. It's a blessing that there are only a few who can master this abomination of design, but when they do, holy smokes, it's incredible - it's no accident that the most impressive and outrageous roaming videos are made by thief players.

 

It's been clear since way back in the day that an average thief can outperform anything else in competitive modes. Come on. It's time to change the core mechanic to something sensible, get rid of the idea that it's fine to have ..well... everything on a single class and without cooldowns. 

Please understand that I'm not just asking for nerfs. I'm asking for a rework. Make things more balanced, let's see some LEVELLING UP!

 

 

Let me see if I follow your point: 

 

1. Thief is designed in such a way so that only players who are willing to put in time to get good at the class are able to play it well

 

2. Some players put in the time and can play the class well

 

3. Thief should therefore be "redesigned" (nerfed)

 

Got it, makes total sense.