What is the proof that Anet hates Thief?

[Squeesidhe.4761]

Not referring to the nerfs - the hate is self-evident there. I mean things Anet has said in the past. I keep seeing reference to the fact that "Anet hates Thieves / wants to remove the entire class / has wanted it gone since game launch / no one on team plays Thief / etc."

 

I don't doubt any of it, but here's the thing: some of us have spent real time and $$ on our Thieves, and it is not acceptable if Anet is trying to sabotage the class for whatever reason. 

 

If it's true and Anet has been trying to drive us away from the class with these nerfs - why? The assassin / stealth archetype is one of the most common ones in MMOs and fantasy games. Most MMOs and fantasy RPGs have some variant of Thief. And Anet's Thief is particularly cool - double pistols, high mobility, kung-fu combat, shadow magic - what's the problem here? 

 

And Anet seems happy to sell outfits like True Assassin, Abyss Stalker, and Shadow Assassin that seem tailored for Thief. Hell, even a lot of medium armors seem to have been designed with Thief in mind.

 

So what specific proof do we have where they've said that they want to destroy the class? 

 

If they've said it, let's hold them accountable. 

[JaxLeo.7912]

to me one of the biggest proofs is how they refer to thief as the "selfish" class (as seen in many of the streams showing previews of gameplay), Guild Wars 2 is a game that is inherently social by design, and here's the thing, social games always have an issue with selfishness.
for example: let's imagine a D&D campaign, you and a group of people are playing together, one of them chooses to play a selfish character, in his selfishness he is likely to end up sabotaging or betraying the group, thus causing frustration to you and the rest of the players, and in the end nobody will have fun due to that one player and the Game Master for allowing that kind of gameplay in the first place.
i think that is the situation with thief, the sefishness at the core of the design goes against every system in the game, so it creates frustration to the thief players because in PvE we are not as efective as others are when playing in a team because you can't exactly ambush an NPC and thus are sometimes shunned, and in PvP/WvW it creates frustration because of how thief is designed to have a strong ability to ambush

[Bern.9613]

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Edited October 16, 2022 by Bern.9613

[Verdict is Vengence.6912]

They gave thief deadeye. There was literally no need for such an espec with warrior already having a sniper skill with rifle burst.

Why did they give thief deadeye? Because they heard the calls from thieves for it. I haven't heard of any other class that got their prayers answered in such a way. Anet doesn't hate thief.

Or maybe they do now, but before they didn't.

[Bern.9613]

On 10/6/2022 at 12:00 AM, Dr Meta.3158 said:

 

 

Edited October 16, 2022 by Bern.9613

[Bern.9613]

On 10/6/2022 at 12:11 AM, Verdict is Vengence.6912 said:

 

 

Edited October 16, 2022 by Bern.9613

[Verdict is Vengence.6912]

1 minute ago, Bern.9613 said:

To give thief long range ability. One thousand five hundred range with kneel skills just not the same 1500 range that ranger has on long bow. Because, you know, working as intended.

Yea, there is no reason for thief to have a long range ability. I remember it clearly. Because thieves asked for it, they received a sniper build.

Warrior has been asking for ages for change to core warrior. Years later, we just now received a few changes. There was literally no other class that received a whole espec just from asking for it. 

Just because thieves may be running into a rough patch now, doesn't mean they haven't been cared for in the past.

[Carnifex.3275]

57 minutes ago, Dr Meta.3158 said:

Thief's design doesn't belong in this game. In a sense it was like it was developed for another game. It is also an inherently toxic design, promotes toxic gameplay in pvp and is a very attractive class to toxic individuals.

Meanwhile Scrapper pops his gyro and tons of ppl go into stealth. Say what again? Even community seems to hate Thief for some reason. I can say only 1 thing. Create a thief and go play it, you'll see how sad it is.

[Sylvia.4870]

  Pure curiousity:

1. Hate the profession because of its design?

2. Hate the profession because of lacking the knowledge about its mechanics?

3. Hate the profession because of its playstyle?

4. Hate the profession because of its  access  to stealth?

5 .Hate the profession because of its  access  to mobility?

6.  Hate the profession because of the unique cooldown timer for the weapon skills, known as Initiative?

7.  Hate the profession because of its slippery for being hard to catch?

  Yes. I have met some poeple with hatred within their minds under these conditions up till now. I'm not surprised. As long as they don't stand in the position I am, they will never get away from hate and never be different from madmen or boring crybabies.  Some of them expected  the Thief to fight them under the specific rules, which the Thief can't - fighting with no dirty tricks, no magic like warrior, for example. Some complained to me with these: ''I'm done with you. All you do is run. Sh-t is so sad'',''Coward'',''Chicken sh-t'' and so on.

 I don't know about the ones  in the current 'Balance' team nor the ones  who chopped the class in each one of the patches from the past till the present, but there is one thing I can feel obviously, passion in their hearts isn't so same as it was. Additionally, they made mistakes on the Acrobatics  trait  and the Specter's shroud. The Hard to Catch - spamming shadowsteps for gaining  a portion of endurance? Excuse me? I already have vigor  after evading an incoming attack of  a foe's. The Evasion for 2 seconds after using the Elite skill? I don't rely on that much. The previous version of its was more reliable even if its cooldown time was 5 minutes. I don't get it. Why make it so complicated?  Reducing  the coefficient of the shroud from 1.65 to 0.69? Unbearable.Unacceptable. The shroud  for the specter isn't effective anymore.

 

 

 

Edited October 6, 2022 by Sylvia.4870

[Jumpel.3972]

16 hours ago, Squeesidhe.4761 said:

Not referring to the nerfs - the hate is self-evident there. I mean things Anet has said in the past. I keep seeing reference to the fact that "Anet hates Thieves / wants to remove the entire class / has wanted it gone since game launch / no one on team plays Thief / etc."

Anet doesn't hate Thief or it would be completely redesign long ago. But they struggle (don't know ?) to balance it because the initiative mechanism is way different than the cd base mechanism on other prof.

[Dadnir.5038]

4 hours ago, Verdict is Vengence.6912 said:

They gave thief deadeye. There was literally no need for such an espec with warrior already having a sniper skill with rifle burst.

The thief community asked for it, thought...

The devs don't "hate" thief, it's the community that hate it. To be more accurate, the popular ways to play thief are often frustrating for it's opponent. The issue mainly come from how stealth is designed and the relationship thief have with it. And, no, there is no solution that would be well received to this "issue", so the devs make many small infuriating tweaks instead in various attempts to make things "bearable" for everyone.

So, when players think that the devs hate thief, they are wrong, in fact the devs do their utmost to keep the thief as they've envisioned it.

[draxynnic.3719]

11 hours ago, Verdict is Vengence.6912 said:

They gave thief deadeye. There was literally no need for such an espec with warrior already having a sniper skill with rifle burst.

Why did they give thief deadeye? Because they heard the calls from thieves for it. I haven't heard of any other class that got their prayers answered in such a way. Anet doesn't hate thief.

Or maybe they do now, but before they didn't.

Elementalists wanted sword, and an elite focused around attunement-swapping. They got Weaver. If anything, ArenaNet heard 'melee elementalist that swaps attunements a lot' a little too loudly and followed with Catalyst.

A lot of people were asking for a golem profession. Not sure the majority of the engineer hardliners wanted it, but I'm not sure all the thief hardliners wanted a sniper either.

Guardians wanted a longbow, although traps were unexpected. Then they wanted a support option. Then they wanted a mobility option.

Chronomancer was a popular request pre-HoT. And as much as some posters hated it after the announcement, there was some discussion of cloneless mesmer pre-EoD.

Rangers asked for being able to play without a pet, and Soulbeast is about as close to that as I think is reasonably practical.

Ritualist players wanted a ritualist-themed revenant. Renegade wasn't enough for them, and now Viktor has ritualistic elements as well.

[Verdict is Vengence.6912]

2 minutes ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Elementalists wanted sword, and an elite focused around attunement-swapping. They got Weaver. If anything, ArenaNet heard 'melee elementalist that swaps attunements a lot' a little too loudly and followed with Catalyst.

A lot of people were asking for a golem profession. Not sure the majority of the engineer hardliners wanted it, but I'm not sure all the thief hardliners wanted a sniper either.

Guardians wanted a longbow, although traps were unexpected. Then they wanted a support option. Then they wanted a mobility option.

Chronomancer was a popular request pre-HoT. And as much as some posters hated it after the announcement, there was some discussion of cloneless mesmer pre-EoD.

Rangers asked for being able to play without a pet, and Soulbeast is about as close to that as I think is reasonably practical.

Ritualist players wanted a ritualist-themed revenant. Renegade wasn't enough for them, and now Viktor has ritualistic elements as well.

I won't agree with any of this. All those especs had a point and there wasn't a class filling those roles previously. And some you mentioned I've never heard of people wanting.

Deadeye stole (lol cuz thief) warrior's role as a rifleman. There was literally no reason for a invisible sniper to exist beforehand besides thieves begging for it.

[ASP.8093]

14 minutes ago, Verdict is Vengence.6912 said:

Deadeye stole (lol cuz thief) warrior's role as a rifleman. There was literally no reason for a invisible sniper to exist beforehand besides thieves begging for it.

Thief needs a ranged spec for PvE, and a "bunker buster" that can deal with tanky builds in SPvP/WvW. Deadeye fills those roles pretty well. The big Deadeye rework about a year after PoF made sure that Rifle sneak attacks were easy to see, and the current Malice mechanic makes it more interactive than old-style one-hit Backstab builds from before the global competitive damage nerf.

Warrior rifle was always a thing that existed in the context of the Warrior's role as a "master of many weapons" or whatever. You might as well go, "Why does anyone get a Greatsword!? That's stealing from Warriors!"

Edited October 6, 2022 by ASP.8093

[Verdict is Vengence.6912]

4 minutes ago, ASP.8093 said:

Thief needs a ranged spec for PvE, and a "bunker buster" that can deal with tanky builds in SPvP/WvW. Deadeye fills those roles pretty well. The big Deadeye rework about a year after PoF made sure that Rifle sneak attacks were easy to see, and the current Malice mechanic makes it more interactive than old-style one-hit Backstab builds from before the global competitive damage nerf.

Warrior rifle was always a thing that existed in the context of the Warrior's role as a "master of many weapons" or whatever. You might as well go, "Why does anyone get a Greatsword!? That's stealing from Warriors!"

That's a bad take

[Tails.9372]

16 hours ago, JaxLeo.7912 said:

to me one of the biggest proofs is how they refer to thief as the "selfish" class

Not just that, they said that thief is a "selfish class" and therefore they can go a bit "crazy with the numbers" which in praxis means that you have some almost purely dps oriented selfish single target sets which still end up doing less DPS than similar support hybrids on other professions (which also have better utility on top of it). It sure is "crazy" gotta have to give them that.

Edited October 6, 2022 by Tails.9372

[draxynnic.3719]

8 minutes ago, Verdict is Vengence.6912 said:

I won't agree with any of this. All those especs had a point and there wasn't a class filling those roles previously. And some you mentioned I've never heard of people wanting.

Deadeye stole (lol cuz thief) warrior's role as a rifleman. There was literally no reason for a invisible sniper to exist beforehand besides thieves begging for it.

Warrior having Kill Shot really didn't fill the role of a sniper. Plus, you say all the other elite specs had a point...well, the point to deadeye is that thief didn't have a weapon option with range greater than 900. And what do you intuitively expect to get when you combine long range with thief?

Plus, there was concept art that was immediately recognisable as 'rifle thief' before GW2 even released. So it was likely something ArenaNet was considering already.

And in practice...deadeye has risen in the meta lately, but for most of its existence it's been pretty much regarded as a meme or roleplay spec. In PvE, it's mostly good for Qadim. In competitive, it can be annoying, but it has so many restrictions on doing its thing that berserker rifle warrior might actually be better at scoring kills. Certainly, as a rule I'd rather have a daredevil teammate than a deadeye.

So no, I really don't see deadeye as being a special favour to thieves. It's no different in that respect to the elite specialisations I listed, and some I didn't (like a mesmer request for a melee condition weapon. And I'm pretty sure people were asking for a more melee-oriented necromancer before HoT).

[Verdict is Vengence.6912]

Just now, draxynnic.3719 said:

Warrior having Kill Shot really didn't fill the role of a sniper. Plus, you say all the other elite specs had a point...well, the point to deadeye is that thief didn't have a weapon option with range greater than 900. And what do you intuitively expect to get when you combine long range with thief?

Plus, there was concept art that was immediately recognisable as 'rifle thief' before GW2 even released. So it was likely something ArenaNet was considering already.

And in practice...deadeye has risen in the meta lately, but for most of its existence it's been pretty much regarded as a meme or roleplay spec. In PvE, it's mostly good for Qadim. In competitive, it can be annoying, but it has so many restrictions on doing its thing that berserker rifle warrior might actually be better at scoring kills. Certainly, as a rule I'd rather have a daredevil teammate than a deadeye.

So no, I really don't see deadeye as being a special favour to thieves. It's no different in that respect to the elite specialisations I listed, and some I didn't (like a mesmer request for a melee condition weapon. And I'm pretty sure people were asking for a more melee-oriented necromancer before HoT).

Disagree. There was never a reason for deadeye before. It is still unneeded to this day. It was a gift to thief.

Kill Shot actually did fit the role. Rifle warrior was designed as the turn of the century soldier, including the sharpshooter role.

[draxynnic.3719]

3 minutes ago, Verdict is Vengence.6912 said:

Disagree. There was never a reason for deadeye before. It is still unneeded to this day. It was a gift to thief.

Kill Shot actually did fit the role. Rifle warrior was designed as the turn of the century soldier, including the sharpshooter role.

Rifle warrior isn't a sniper. Your description is fairly apt - it's a mostly mobile rifleman, comparable to typical infantry of about a century ago. That involves being able to stop and line up a careful shot every so often, but that doesn't make a sniper. 

And, again, thief didn't have a long-range option. If you're going to argue that other professions had good reason to ask for what they asked for because they were filling gaps, I think it's fair to say that being the only profession limited to 900 range or less represents a gap to be filled for thief. And how else would you introduce a long-range weapon on the thief profession?

[Verdict is Vengence.6912]

Just now, draxynnic.3719 said:

And, again, thief didn't have a long-range option. If you're going to argue that other professions had good reason to ask for what they asked for because they were filling gaps, I think it's fair to say that being the only profession limited to 900 range or less represents a gap to be filled for thief. And how else would you introduce a long-range weapon on the thief profession?

Wrong. Thief didn't need it. Thief has teleports lol

[saerni.2584]

Not sure why it makes sense to argue about whether thief "deserved" to get the elite it did in the previous expansion. 
 

You want to complain? Write a letter to Anet. They are the ones who make the game. 

[Zacchary.6183]

13 hours ago, Verdict is Vengence.6912 said:

Why did they give thief deadeye?

Because thief was the only profession with a max range of 900. The only 1200 things they had were Steal, Shadowstep and Ambush before thief traps were removed.

[Verdict is Vengence.6912]

1 minute ago, Zacchary.6183 said:

Because thief was the only profession with a max range of 900. The only 1200 things they had were Steal, Shadowstep and Ambush before thief traps were removed.

Wrong. Thief asked for the rifle and received the rifle. Can't complain about range when you have the most teleports

[Zacchary.6183]

Just now, Verdict is Vengence.6912 said:

Wrong. Thief asked for the rifle and received the rifle. Can't complain about range when you have the most teleports

Warrior has plenty of movement capabilities too, enough to rival thief. So by your logic, warrior doesn't need 1200 range stuff either.

[draxynnic.3719]

Guys, he's obviously holding thief to a double standard. There's a long list of other professions getting things they asked for, but apparently deadeye is a special case because another profession's rifle does something vaguely similar. I wonder if he's realised that pretty every mainhand sword has a gapcloser and most have some kind of flurry skill, almost like weapons can have common themes across different professions or something. Let's just stop feeding and move on.

To the OP: I don't think ArenaNet as a whole hate Thief. There was, however, evidence in a discord leak that the old balance lead just didn't care about it enough to do the job fairly. With respect to the current team...the shroud nerf does feel heavy-handed. They possibly felt that they had to be given how dominant scourge was in tournaments. I think we'll at least need to see the next update before passing judgement.