How to properly nerf thief for pvp and wvw

[Paradoxoglanis.1904]

Yes yes we all know thief is the most nerfed class, most useless, never meta, worst at "1v1s ", etc. etc. etc. The only way to change that is to finally give stealth the nerfs it deserved 10 years ago. Then you can start buffing other parts of it. To start I suggest:

• Black Powder: Increase cast time from 0.5s to 1s.
• Shadows Rejuvenation: Remove the "gain 2 initiative on entering stealth". Increase initiative gained from leaving stealth from 1 to 2.
• Revert the recent rifle initiative cost nerfs. Instead delete/rework Silent Scope.

Im looking forward to all your rational, constructive feedback.

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

1 hour ago, Paradoxoglanis.1904 said:

Then you can start buffing other parts of it. 

What do you suggest here?

[Paradoxoglanis.1904]

1 hour ago, Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

What do you suggest here?

make staff great again

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

34 minutes ago, Paradoxoglanis.1904 said:

make staff great again

How?

[bq pd.2148]

coming up next: 'omg infinite teleports' with a bit of  'evade evade evade'.

[coffeeScryer.9432]

Hi, not a thief main here but I'd like to stress this: Any desired changes ought to be tested thoroughly, and if it doesn't hit the mark it shouldn't be pushed to the live server.
Back to the drawing board is always preferred. But it should be tested.

[Paradoxoglanis.1904]

2 hours ago, Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

How?

Give it boons, prot, resolution, resistance, cleanse, dark/light combo field. You know, stuff normal classes can have and still be balanced with.

Edited April 16 by Paradoxoglanis.1904

[Terrorhuz.4695]

12 hours ago, Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

How?

Hi Azure I'm your personal thief hater. I'm here to throw ideas. This is what I would do if I could work on staff.

CORE CONCEPT: thief gets to spam the same button over and over. It allows more freedom in the usage of your resources, so long as this button is used correctly. Headshot is the best example of this. Thief design is good when every button does one thing and it should be spammed only if the situation actually calls for it.

CURRENT PROBLEM: staff thief very easily runs out of steam. Initiative costs were increased because every monkey could spam Vault for days and win everything thanks to the age old design, "ONE BUTTON WHICH DOES EVERYTHING" (hello Shadow Shot, hello Pistol Whip, hello Flanking Strike). Initiative costs should be lowered but only for thieves correctly answering to the given situation. Staff was designed as a teamfighting melee weapon, and thus staff skills should reward fighting against multiple targets in melee range. Be it with boons or initiative refunds, the more you hit the more you're using staff the way it's intended.

• AA: it's fine, I love it, it stays like it is.
• Weakening Charge: targets can currently walk out of this thing, need to remove the starting self root. It's like the clunkier brother of Lingering Thoughts, which is very clunky already.  Hitting targets will grant boons; the more foes you hit, the more boons you get.
  What kind of boons will decide the intended usage of this skill. A possible offensive setup would give 1 stack of might per target hit; this creates some kind of building up of damage particularly useful for cleaving scenarios (3 hits against 3 targets; 9 stacks of might from a single skill, in a way not dissimilar from what Split Surge does on mesmer). However I'm inclined towards a more defensive setup:
  • Hit1:  0.5s prot + 0.25s per target
  • Hit2: 0.5s vigor + 0.25s per target
  • Hit3: 0.5s regen + 0.25s per target
  • INTENDED USAGE: This is the tool you use to stay in a fight without being punished for just existing, so long as you consistently hit your targets. Boon duration can be discussed, so long as staff3 doesn't allow to single handedly cap those boons.
• Debilitating Arc: it's gone. Don't act like you miss it, you never pressed that button.
  • It is now called Bandit's Riposte: it is a single block, 0.5s duration, costs 5 initiative.
  • If procced you cast Bandit's Revenge:
    • 0.5s cast time
    • 0.5s evade
    • 120 knockback
    • 180 radius
    • 3 targets.
    • 1.5s fury + 0.5s fury for every target hit
    • 2 initiative restored
  • INTENDED USAGE: This is your hard defensive button. Of course we can't give thief a channeled block in a weapon skill, but I think staff deserves a single riposte with a short duration to defend yourself against single big hitters, maybe shake off a bit of unwanted attention when focused (something thief struggles with unless you're using a lot of stealth and ports; this design of staff tries to avoid that). In the meantime you also get to set up Vault with a CC (more on that later) and fury, why tf not.
• Dust Strike: it restored to whatever it used to be, this iteration of the skill is a troll. Blind duration is halved against targets which are already blinded.
  • INTENDED USAGE: either reactively blinding some opponent's skill or preemptively blinding the opponent before engaging. Don't stack 30 minutes of blind though, this is irritating.
• Vault: Increase radius from 180 to 240, this thing never kittening lands. Restores 1 initiative for every opponent hit, up to a max of 3 ini restored. 25% damage increased against crowd controlled targets.
  • INTENDED USAGE: bonk. But AoE. Multi faceted skill:
    • It rewards the knockback from Bandit's Defense, but not too much because targets are spread out and won't be hit to refund your initiative. In short: expensive and single target, but higher damage (thanks to fury and damage increase from CC).
    • It rewards cleaving situations, the initiative refund will let you go ham on people trying to res. Cheap AoE bonks, each with lower damage (no fury, no CC to set it up).
    • Using it without the preconditions (either a CC to ensure it lands with fat damage or having targeted multiple opponents) will just drain you of initiative. You can't spam vault for defensive value: the evade exists just to allow you to land it. 

Boom, you have teamfight staff thief. Thank me later.

Edited April 16 by Terrorhuz.4695

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

9 hours ago, Terrorhuz.4695 said:

Hi Azure I'm your personal thief hater. I'm here to throw ideas. This is what I would do if I could work on staff.

[Various good design ideas]

kitten a mesmer I agree with? That's crazy. First time for everything. ❤️

Quote

Debilitating Arc: it's gone. Don't act like you miss it, you never pressed that button.

I did before they reworked it twice into what it is now 💀

Quote

• If procced you cast Bandit's Revenge:
  • 0.5s cast time
  • 0.5s evade
  • 120 knockback
  • 180 radius
  • 3 targets.
  • 1.5s fury + 0.5s fury for every target hit
  • 2 initiative restored

Vault: Increase radius from 180 to 240, this thing never kittening lands. Restores 1 initiative for every opponent hit, up to a max of 3 ini restored. 25% damage increased against crowd controlled targets.

This is how you get me to stop spamming or being degen; by rewarding me for timing with things that let me stay in the fight or combo chain. 

Very good. Rewarding init on hit thresholds that arent outlandishly arbitrary (looking at you, unload), is a plus. Weapon would be picked up if this was the balance direction we had for low stealth thief. It has utility that works in 1v1 but the per target scaling makes it usable in skirmishes.

Quote

• Dust Strike: it restored to whatever it used to be, this iteration of the skill is a troll. Blind duration is halved against targets which are already blinded.
  • INTENDED USAGE: either reactively blinding some opponent's skill or preemptively blinding the opponent before engaging. Don't stack 30 minutes of blind though, this is irritating.

remember they yoinked the reflect off of the auto chain because nobody was using it (because it required you to finish an auto chain in melee to use ofc). dust strike should retain the reflect projectiles quality, but only for the conical AOE it affects. blind duration halved is fine.

Edited April 16 by Azure The Heartless.3261

[Codename T.2847]

On 4/15/2024 at 8:40 PM, Paradoxoglanis.1904 said:

Yes yes we all know thief is the most nerfed class, most useless, never meta, worst at "1v1s ", etc. etc. etc. The only way to change that is to finally give stealth the nerfs it deserved 10 years ago. Then you can start buffing other parts of it. To start I suggest:

• Black Powder: Increase cast time from 0.5s to 1s.
• Shadows Rejuvenation: Remove the "gain 2 initiative on entering stealth". Increase initiative gained from leaving stealth from 1 to 2.
• Revert the recent rifle initiative cost nerfs. Instead delete/rework Silent Scope.

Im looking forward to all your rational, constructive feedback.

No. Thief mains are the most oppressed groups of people in videogame history and they will make sure you never hear the end of it.. : ) 

[Eugenides.1274]

On 4/16/2024 at 3:40 AM, Paradoxoglanis.1904 said:

• Shadows Rejuvenation: Remove the "gain 2 initiative on entering stealth". Increase initiative gained from leaving stealth from 1 to 2.

In PvP and WvW even if you adjust the current values Shadow Rejuvenation rewards degenerate gameplay a bit too much in my opinion. Making it reward you for hitting with a stealth attack is a healthier approach they could take if they want to rework it.

For example, "Gain X initiative when you strike an enemy with a stealth attack." or even "Gain X initiative when striking an enemy from stealth." You could potentially add secondary effects to the trait or make it give back higher amount of initiative if it feels too weak since the thief ends up being revealed when proccing it.

[Invictorum.7643]

1 hour ago, Eugenides.1274 said:

In PvP and WvW even if you adjust the current values Shadow Rejuvenation rewards degenerate gameplay a bit too much in my opinion. Making it reward you for hitting with a stealth attack is a healthier approach they could take if they want to rework it.

For example, "Gain X initiative when you strike an enemy with a stealth attack." or even "Gain X initiative when striking an enemy from stealth." You could potentially add secondary effects to the trait or make it give back higher amount of initiative if it feels too weak since the thief ends up being revealed when proccing it.

Degenerate gameplay? It encourages popping in and out of stealth, instead of constantly stacking it. Which is effectively just a glorified target break. I dont really see how that could be considered degenerate, considering a chunk of Mirage's kit does the same thing.

SA as a whole got rebalanced to move away from stealth stacking literally because people complained about "degenerate gameplay", to this system of encouraging constantly dancing between stealthed and unstealthed. If it's nerfed further, it's probably gonna end up a dead traitline and then you get to deal with acro/tricks/DD sword/dagger duelists again.

[Eugenides.1274]

6 minutes ago, Invictorum.7643 said:

Degenerate gameplay? It encourages popping in and out of stealth, instead of constantly stacking it. Which is effectively just a glorified target break. I dont really see how that could be considered degenerate, considering a chunk of Mirage's kit does the same thing.

I don't know how else you would describe back to back to back Black Powder -> Bound / Black Powder -> Heartseeker / Sniper's Cover -> Death's Advance / Cloak and Dagger (on walls) chaining other than degenerate gameplay. Just because other classes can do similar things doesn't make it a false statement (classes can have similar issues). We've all fought those thieves where all you have to do is sneeze on them in a fight and then they stealth chain for 30 seconds waiting for cooldowns. Sure, if they're just chaining stealth they're not damaging you but I personally don't think it's a healthy gameplay style.

7 minutes ago, Invictorum.7643 said:

SA as a whole got rebalanced to move away from stealth stacking literally because people complained about "degenerate gameplay", to this system of encouraging constantly dancing between stealthed and unstealthed. If it's nerfed further, it's probably gonna end up a dead traitline and then you get to deal with acro/tricks/DD sword/dagger duelists again.

I agree that old SA was worse but I feel like the current SA only moved the bar. The old SA stealth on steal, stealth on healing skill use, ini regen/healing while in stealth were kind of insane design choices looking back on them. I don't think changing Shadow Rejuvenation to reward on attacking from stealth would kill the traitline. You could even make it give 4 or 5 initiative since you have to proc revealed to get initiative back.

I'm also personally okay with seeing builds other than d/p or rifle SA.

[Invictorum.7643]

4 minutes ago, Eugenides.1274 said:

I don't know how else you would describe back to back to back Black Powder -> Bound / Black Powder -> Heartseeker / Sniper's Cover -> Death's Advance / Cloak and Dagger (on walls) chaining other than degenerate gameplay. Just because other classes can do similar things doesn't make it a false statement (classes can have similar issues). We've all fought those thieves where all you have to do is sneeze on them in a fight and then they stealth chain for 30 seconds waiting for cooldowns.

Chaining and init dumping into stealth only activates the entrance part though. So kinda self defeating in the long run, especially with Anet's longstanding nerfs toward Thief initiative costs. Plus if you force a thief to back off for 30 seconds on his cooldowns while you cap a point? Congrats, you win the fight.

13 minutes ago, Eugenides.1274 said:

Sure, if they're just chaining stealth they're not damaging you but I personally don't think it's a healthy gameplay style.

You dont think this is a healthy gameplay style, and half of us thieves don't feel willbender's current design is a healthy gameplay style. We're free to our own opinions.

14 minutes ago, Eugenides.1274 said:

I don't think changing Shadow Rejuvenation to reward on attacking from stealth would kill the traitline. You could even make it give 4 or 5 initiative since you have to proc revealed to get initiative back.

It wouldn't kill the trainline, it'd do the opposite. Most PvP/WvW Thieves would be MORE forced to take it. Our other traitlines simply aren't viable half the time with half the weapons. There's a strong reason we constantly use D/P or Rifle, and it's because those are the only weapons we can make work against most targets. D/P because it lets us use a majority of our kit most of the time, and it has incredibly utility through on demand daze from pistol 4, and smoke fields on pistol 5. Rifle because it is quite literally our ONLY viable long range choice. Pistol is a one trick pony, and dead in the water immediatly after, while shortbow only sees use because Infiltrator's Arrow is simply too good to pass up because of Z axis mobility.

SA will continue being the only other choice alongside Trickery, simply because it allows us to survive in the current meta of boon and condition spam. It has both condition removal entering/exiting stealth, and a tiny bit of healing. Otherwise a condi bomb will kinda just delete thieves.

 

21 minutes ago, Eugenides.1274 said:

I'm also personally okay with seeing builds other than d/p or rifle SA.

Once they're viable to play over the current mainstays, you will. But because of how the game is currently balanced, Thief will constantly have Trickery and SA staple glued to their sides.

[ZvolTx.3165]

6 hours ago, Eugenides.1274 said:

For example, "Gain X initiative when you strike an enemy with a stealth attack." or even "Gain X initiative when striking an enemy from stealth." You could potentially add secondary effects to the trait or make it give back higher amount of initiative if it feels too weak since the thief ends up being revealed when proccing it.

I like this idea. There are some builds that are only possible because of shadows rejuv, especially opening up non-trickery options. The current iteration however unfortunately leads to d/p being even more broken than it was during the permastealth days. Back with permastealth, especially before bound, doing a BP+4xHS was something that 1: took fairly good timing and positioning to do, and 2: offers perfect counterplay by just standing on the BP to force reveal or force them to stop stacking. Now, it's incredibly easy to maintain 99% stealth that is far harder to counterplay.... leading me to... 

 

4 hours ago, Eugenides.1274 said:

back to back to back Black Powder -> Bound / Black Powder -> Heartseeker / Sniper's Cover -> Death's Advance / Cloak and Dagger (on walls)

The real offender now is BP HS....HS. 

You are only unstealthed for a brief moment at the end of your HS animation if you time it so you HS again through the field at the very end, regaining stealth from the combo JUST as the first stealth runs out. It makes maintaining functionally permastealth much easier, only requiring basic timing ability to do it well enough to make it extremely difficult to counterplay with a short enough unstealthed gap.

Now, all you need to know is the trick and you'll never run out of initiative since it also procs the trait with this method. You can also stand away from the field to avoid damage and leap into it at the end. Plus you can't be forced revealed doing it since you're not getting damage frames while stealthed on the HS to re-stealth... 

It's a far more annoying build to face than the old slow permastealth builds that took slightly more skill to play and had more counterplay on other thief builds. These days you can do this easily while still running dash, so you can't get locked down AND can permastealth... the safest high spike build in the game easily. 

A DE on SA rifle that knows how to use this same timing on rifle 4 is also broken. To regain initiative on revealed rather than unstealthed would be a great way to reduce this ability to easily permastealth without skill or counterplay.

I do still like the 1 init on stealth though. I often use cele p/p bound if I come across annoying cele builds or similarly broken af builds that I don't wanna fight an uphill battle against. As great as it is, I admit that it would probably be healthier to promote an aggressive play style through encouraging stealth attacks rather than stealth stacking with a basic timing trick. A trick that lets you maintain permanent control over pacing in a fight with very little skill or game knowledge. Cele p/p bound isn't really as strong as it used to be, tbh tho. Relic change removed the aristocracy synergy that let you maintain 10-15 might easily.. D/P with SA and DE rifle SA are the biggest issues for sure, but the change would be healthy all around I think. 

I really don't care about what boring d/p thieves think about "but muh I can't fight XYZ class/build then". Over-performing builds should be balanced down, that's what should be advocated for. Not everyone wants to play the weapon set that's been defacto thief meta since late 2012 when popularized by a top PvP player. It gets boring fighting 95% d/p thieves for over a decade. 

 

 

 

Edited April 17 by ZvolTx.3165

[kiranslee.4829]

Stealth to backstab to blind to stealth. This is generic thief rotation, i dont know how hard is to understand where the problem is :). 

[Axl.8924]

10 hours ago, Eugenides.1274 said:

I don't know how else you would describe back to back to back Black Powder -> Bound / Black Powder -> Heartseeker / Sniper's Cover -> Death's Advance / Cloak and Dagger (on walls) chaining other than degenerate gameplay. Just because other classes can do similar things doesn't make it a false statement (classes can have similar issues). We've all fought those thieves where all you have to do is sneeze on them in a fight and then they stealth chain for 30 seconds waiting for cooldowns. Sure, if they're just chaining stealth they're not damaging you but I personally don't think it's a healthy gameplay style.

I agree that old SA was worse but I feel like the current SA only moved the bar. The old SA stealth on steal, stealth on healing skill use, ini regen/healing while in stealth were kind of insane design choices looking back on them. I don't think changing Shadow Rejuvenation to reward on attacking from stealth would kill the traitline. You could even make it give 4 or 5 initiative since you have to proc revealed to get initiative back.

I'm also personally okay with seeing builds other than d/p or rifle SA.

What do you want thief to do outside of stealth then? stand there and be training dummies? what kitten do you want them to do?

I'm not saying i want them to be unhealthy n all that but they got to be good at something.People want it to do no damage have no stealth  have no teleports, but that just makes the thief a training dummy rather than a fun exciting experience. I am all for positive hcanges to make the game better but please enlighten me how you plan to prevent them from being unplayable? especially since thieves are all about going in and out of stealth and attacking in secret.How do you plan to prevent its lore type from being destroyed? how do you plan to explain that part too if it all the sudden has a bunch of buffs such as prot and such and no stealth?

 

Edited April 17 by Axl.8924

[Jugglemonkey.8741]

Tbh there isn't much point arguing with thief haters. They will justify their tears by saying that stealth is degenerate, then when it's pointed out that engi, ranger and mesmer also have stealth they just complain that thief is a special case because it's designed around it, despite thief not having close to the same one shot burst potential as the other classes. Would people complain about mesmer stealth if thief didn't exist?

You can't have your cake and eat it. Stealth is either an issue on everything or it's not an issue at all. Propose changes to ALL stealth on ALL classes because the stealth mechanic itself is degenerate or just admit that you hate thieves and move on already. 

By the way: nerfing thief stealth access without compensating that by increasing sustain or damage in other areas will just result in MORE of the "run away and wait for cooldowns" behaviour that you find so degenerate. Think about it. 

[kash.9213]

30 minutes ago, Jugglemonkey.8741 said:

Tbh there isn't much point arguing with thief haters. They will justify their tears by saying that stealth is degenerate, then when it's pointed out that engi, ranger and mesmer also have stealth they just complain that thief is a special case because it's designed around it, despite thief not having close to the same one shot burst potential as the other classes. Would people complain about mesmer stealth if thief didn't exist?

You can't have your cake and eat it. Stealth is either an issue on everything or it's not an issue at all. Propose changes to ALL stealth on ALL classes because the stealth mechanic itself is degenerate or just admit that you hate thieves and move on already. 

By the way: nerfing thief stealth access without compensating that by increasing sustain or damage in other areas will just result in MORE of the "run away and wait for cooldowns" behaviour that you find so degenerate. Think about it. 

People still getting themselves oneshot from stealth in the WvW forums though. People need to post their builds right next to their complaints from now on there because I feel like there are no parameters to go by when they talk about stealth, damage, mobility, etc. My condi specter templates are really close to baseline raid stats which have some vitality but not a lot of other modifiers to mitigate an opener, and I routinely survived opening sequences to bounce out and collect myself even if some people craft better openers than others. My own stealth doesn't mitigate that either if the cleaves and circles are already in play. I'm more prepared to face an opener on my Marauder Acro template but that's not very tanky either if I do get tagged and I'm still not getting closed out even if they got to prep a heavy sequence in stealth. 

I'm down for some Stealth critique because I think the visual gameplay and player to player dynamic could be handled better in that regard but it's not all that once I know their lane behavior. Guess I'm just not on that level where I can walk out there in full glass yet but they got me feeling like I should give a go.

I'm more afraid of thieves who know what to line up to dismantle my mitigation to keep my Healthbar open and raw which is happening regardless of stealth and that might be more of who they're actually thinking about. I can see some argument for a need to counter stealth more if visual indicators could have given that dismantling away but I'm not sure it would. 

Edited April 17 by kash.9213

[Jugglemonkey.8741]

5 minutes ago, kash.9213 said:

People still getting themselves oneshot from stealth in the WvW forums though. People need to post their builds right next to their complaints from now on there because I feel like there are no parameters to go by when they talk about stealth, damage, mobility, etc. My condi specter templates are really close to baseline raid stats which have some vitality but not a lot of other modifiers to mitigate an opener, and I routinely survive opening sequence to bounce out and collect myself even if some people craft better openers than others. My own stealth doesn't mitigate that either if the cleaves and circles are already in play. 

I'm down for some Stealth critique because I think the visual gameplay and player to player dynamic could be handled better in that regard but it's not all that once I know their lane behavior. Guess I'm just not on that level where I can walk out there in full glass yet.

For sure, knowing people's builds would help. I've long said that if you're a bad player for bringing a roaming build to a zerg fight, you're also bad for doing the opposite. People keep on taking their group builds into small scale/1v1 and wonder why they get steamrolled tho, you can't balance a class around other people's poor decisions.

I don't mind stealth being debated. Honestly I'd be fine with it not existing at all, if things were properly balanced to compensated for the loss. What I have an issue with is the inherent motte-and-bailey fallacy where people say that stealth gameplay is degenerate from the perspective of the one fighting it (which is something I actually agree with), and then using that as justification to propose ONLY thief nerfs. 

By all means, change how stealth works to make it a healthier mechanic, or rework/remove it entirely. I'd just appreciate it if people stopped using it as a springboard for their personal vendetta and treat all classes that utilise stealth tactics the same way. 

[kash.9213]

43 minutes ago, Jugglemonkey.8741 said:

For sure, knowing people's builds would help. I've long said that if you're a bad player for bringing a roaming build to a zerg fight, you're also bad for doing the opposite. People keep on taking their group builds into small scale/1v1 and wonder why they get steamrolled tho, you can't balance a class around other people's poor decisions.

I don't mind stealth being debated. Honestly I'd be fine with it not existing at all, if things were properly balanced to compensated for the loss. What I have an issue with is the inherent motte-and-bailey fallacy where people say that stealth gameplay is degenerate from the perspective of the one fighting it (which is something I actually agree with), and then using that as justification to propose ONLY thief nerfs. 

By all means, change how stealth works to make it a healthier mechanic, or rework/remove it entirely. I'd just appreciate it if people stopped using it as a springboard for their personal vendetta and treat all classes that utilise stealth tactics the same way. 

Ya I wish stealth was more about map travel and obfuscation and more about crafting a nice approach or opener, but degenerate is a huge stretch. I've played stealth in other games and this one actually requires steps and maintenance mostly and those steps can be messed with even. 

[ZvolTx.3165]

I just like that +init on reveal change to shadow rejuv idea as a way to reduce d/p and rifle permastealth. I agree that other balance changes (nerfs in other classes) are needed to make sure thief is still capable, but that's a separate issue. This current balance severely handicaps thief v thief fights fo non-permastealth builds. 

Also just saying but... most of my builds aren't even running trickery anymore and I'm still beating most wb, sb, harb, etc that I come across. In-class build diversity is at one of its best states the game has ever had, EXCEPT for the rifle DE and d/p interaction with shadows rejuv allowing on demand functional permastealth with zero cost and little counterplay. Change this and thief v thief (the peak of dueling) balance becomes significantly better.