A shallow grave indeed, guys ...

[itspomf.9523]

You barely threw some dirt on top of an already rotting corpse and called it a day.  Even Zhaitan has more class than that.

Quote

Specter is currently one of the most powerful specializations in PvP. The build has a lot of strengths, but the thing that stands out is the sheer amount of shroud health available, especially in combination with additional sources of vitality.  We're reducing the shroud health by a significant amount, with the goal of making specters a bit easier to kill.

• Reduced Shadow Shroud health scaling from 1.5 to 0.69.

Well, you did it.  With 31% lower health than having +0 Vitality and base HP when in shroud, Specter is confirmed for dead.

Might as well just trade their tradeoff of -3 max Initiative for "no longer receives an F1 or class ability," while you're at it.

I know this sounds salty, and I confess that it is, because I already disliked the clunky and awkward implementation of the specialization, and this just kills any of the waning interest I had in it.  I now sincerely regret sinking those spare hero points into this sad little dumpster fire of a trainwreck.

Edited October 4, 2022 by itspomf.9523
adjustments to formatting

[senftube.6081]

Thief dead

[keykey.9182]

Agree, was having a blast playing Alac Specter in Strikes and content in general.

 

Best thing of all is that they aimed this at being unkillable at PVP but they massacred the PvE aspect aswell, what a game.

[Pheex.8932]

This is one of the most ludicrous over the top nerfs I've ever seen in an MMO.

I can stay about 8 seconds in a full shroud now (without taking damage) ((Edit: this might be a scaling bug for low level zones?))

Edited October 5, 2022 by Pheex.8932

[Vismooth.4128]

Hilarious. They really did push it out, no changes at all, despite saying they'd make some. Thanks for nothing, I guess.

[xblankk.4207]

Haven't got to actually playing, but I did hop on and try to make some builds with the changes...

I think they may have killed thief completely in all game modes lol.

 

From a PvP perspective:

Daredevil - maybe can do something with Acro, but I doubt it. I think Trickery and SA are still better picks and that fell out of the meta with EoD.

Specter - likely dead now.

Deadeye - probably survived, but it got the small nerf on superspeed stealth with SA.

Core - lol.

[Vismooth.4128]

17.9k shroud health from 39k before
8k heal at max stacks

T H A N K S
A G A I N

Edited October 4, 2022 by Vismooth.4128

[kash.9213]

I'd have to see how much I would have to adjust in a fight. I go in and out of Shadow Shroud a lot and I would definitely feel less enthused about logging in if my time in Shroud is cut. 

Am I just running into the smarter players in World vs World because I feel like my Shroud Health can get depleted in a flash pretty regularly, maybe people don't eat Control skills in other modes or don't get focused. Give Shroud a break bar with some unique parameters or something so that smarter play can deal with my Shroud, but care and anticipation on my part can enjoy playing in Shroud. 

[Shade.8971]

Anet forgot thiefs aren't necros? Itty bitty shroud health is very bad in PvE

[JaxLeo.7912]

and people thought having CMC as balance director would bring good things for the game's balance, absolute clowns, just the first patch under his management and he has already shown he is just as incompetent as whoever designed warrior for the infamous june patch

 

guess he was smart doing it with a class 90% of the player base either doesn't care about or want to see gutted and tossed under the rug

 

brilliant work, this game really is a bad joke, i don't even know why i bother, has been the same ever since i started playing in the HoT days

Edited October 4, 2022 by JaxLeo.7912

[Nomad.4301]

Pretty sure this also massively impacts shadow force generation given that the only 2 ways (technically 3 with trait) to generate SF was via percentage conversions (siphon gives a % of overall SF) which will now be lowered by the same amount as shroud, meaning that not only was the amount of shroud butchered but also the amount of shroud you can regenerate as well.

Haven't been able to log-in yet, but yeah this isn't looking good.

[Doggie.3184]

If putting new people in charge doesn't fix or improve anything then what's the point? What exactly does Anet want for this class outside of Spvp? It's just not suited for how the game is designed and feels alien in all content.

Edited October 4, 2022 by Doggie.3184

[khogau.1985]

I was enjoying Specter until this shroud change. It's nice for thief to have options and Specter was a welcome addition for me along with pDD and cDD. With this nerf to shroud, it just feels bad to play in PVE now being kicked out while in shroud while trying to keep up with rotation. If you're targeting Specter's performance in PvP, MAKE THE CHANGE IN THAT GAME MODE, and leave PVE out of it. 

[Bern.9613]

1 hour ago, Doggie.3184 said:

If putting new people in charge doesn't fix or improve anything then what's the point? What exactly does Anet want for this class outside of Spvp? It's just not suited for how the game is designed and feels alien in all content.

Promote to next level of incompetence. Saw that a lot in the military.

You must be new around here. I played thief since launch. I played against other known thieves like Yishis, and blackbyrd and Wyld Bill. I know that Jinx is still around, he's been playing thief for a long time as well. When gw2 was brought onto the MMO scene, stealth class, assassin, rogue, thief, was the quintessential. Apparently now it is "a source of frustration". I have been watching the decline and ultimately the disembowelment of the thief over the past decade. Twenty eighth of June was the final straw for me. Question still remains: how much more abuse to the thief are you willing to endure?

Edit: Found one of Yishis' old video. A lot of old traits in this one.

 

Edited October 4, 2022 by Bern.9613

[Mincsk.6028]

3 minutes ago, Bern.9613 said:

Promote to next level of incompetence. Saw that a lot in the military.

You must be new around here. I played thief since launch. I played against other known thieves like Yishis, and blackbyrd and Wyld Bill. I know that Jinx is still around, he's been playing thief for a long time as well. When gw2 was brought onto the MMO scene, stealth class, assassin, rogue, thief, was the quintessential. Apparently now it is "a source of frustration". I have been watching the decline and ultimately the disembowelment of the thief over the past decade. Twenty eighth of June was the final straw for me. Question still remains: how much more abuse to the thief are you willing to endure?

My tinfoil hat is warm. My spidy sense is tingling. I suspect sabotage in the balance team tbh. (or they are quite quitting) Because they are just like "lalalalalala dgaf what they think", "just forget we offer this profession to our player base" I'm sitting here as a customer thinking omg they don't even care enough to play this pile of crap to see how many of us feel. It's absurd really.

[Squeesidhe.4761]

I don't follow all the numbers crunching that might be behind this nerf, but I was doing some PVP earlier today and my Shroud was vanishing almost instantly. Like, I'd pop it at full strength and a second later it was gone. It happened so fast that it was screwing with my gameplay - i.e., I'd strategically pop Shroud for the extra health to deal with a tough opponent or to Fear someone, then find myself in normal mode so fast that I'd be thrown off balance and destroyed by the opposing player. 

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

6 hours ago, Pheex.8932 said:

I can stay about 8 seconds in a full shroud now (without taking damage)

 

This is one of the most ludicrous over the top nerfs I've ever seen in an MMO. Absolutely laughable.

That's... probably a bug.  The degen on shroud should be proportionally based.  If the natural degen is now killing off the shroud faster than it did in the past, then it is a bug.

[Doggie.3184]

3 hours ago, Bern.9613 said:

You must be new around here.

lmao

[Pheex.8932]

3 hours ago, Blood Red Arachnid.2493 said:

That's... probably a bug.  The degen on shroud should be proportionally based.  If the natural degen is now killing off the shroud faster than it did in the past, then it is a bug.

I think it's a proportion bug. When I was scaled to level 8 or something trying out the shroud in queensdale I could stay in it for a few seconds max. When I did lv 80 content it seemed fine again.

[ArcanistSeven.8720]

21 hours ago, itspomf.9523 said:

I already disliked the clunky and awkward implementation of the specialization, and this just kills any of the waning interest I had in it.  I now sincerely regret sinking those spare hero points into this sad little dumpster fire of a trainwreck.

The class does not feel good to play in PVE.

1. Single targeting allies is just bad when the game was not built around it and auto targeting party member when you don't want to is kittening annoying.

2. Having -3 initiative and initiative costs increased across the board means were literally stuck using scepter if we wanna do anything.

3. Teleports on wells is annoying and was only made to synergize with shadow arts.

4.They nerfed invigorating precision so its being pretty much useless now if thief wants survivability they'll have to specter.

Just like you i have no desire to play this confused spec that doesnt know what it wants to be. Its trying to be a healer but struggles to be, and Anet making the heals single target made sure heal thief was going to be a meme. i already pretty much rerolled to mech anyways it does better healing.

Edited October 5, 2022 by ArcanistSeven.8720

[Valisha.8650]

Nothing like taking an already underplayed e-spec and nerfing it further. That's not even beating a dead horse at this point. It's beating a dead horse's skeleton.

[Asahi.1487]

Opinions don't matter anet wants to remove thief from the game.  Been like that from release.