Spears are confirmed 2h. After this xpac, thief will have gone 13 years with no new offhand.

[Mixchimmer.7230]

And Elementalist gets up to like 20 new skills per weapon.

 

just why…?

[Doggie.3184]

Lack of interest. Some things are more fun to work on for developers than others.

But if it helps, Thief Spear has one of the best movesets in game. Only problem is it may not be similar at all on land so we'll have to wait and see what it does.

At the rate they been goin' though it's likely to be our 4th single-target ranged weapon with a super-loud sound effect ina row. 😌

[Lightsbane.9012]

i just hope spear comes out on release day for the expansion.  it was terrible waiting six months for axe.

[Nomad.4301]

3 hours ago, Lightsbane.9012 said:

it was terrible waiting six months for axe.

Yeah It was fun waiting half a year to get a weapon that I proceeded to use for all of 30 minutes and went "Oh.. Ok then, never touching that again"

Spear will probably be another lame attempt at a ranged weapon considering it will be very difficult for them to make it any different from staff (animations aside), unless they make it a melee condi-only addition, marking it as the third condi-only weapon in a row. Not exactly hyped about yet another 2H weapon either way 😴.

[BobbyT.7192]

They really seem to avoid off hand weapons like the plague.

[draxynnic.3719]

9 hours ago, Nomad.4301 said:

Yeah It was fun waiting half a year to get a weapon that I proceeded to use for all of 30 minutes and went "Oh.. Ok then, never touching that again"

Spear will probably be another lame attempt at a ranged weapon considering it will be very difficult for them to make it any different from staff (animations aside), unless they make it a melee condi-only addition, marking it as the third condi-only weapon in a row. Not exactly hyped about yet another 2H weapon either way 😴.

A condi-only melee weapon might work well. All of the existing melee weapons have power- or CC-based stealth attacks, so there's space for a melee condition-oriented stealth attack for deadeye.

Lack of a new offhand on the one profession where an offhand would actually be a big deal is a bit tiring, though.

[Rezok.2709]

On 6/4/2024 at 6:31 PM, Mixchimmer.7230 said:

And Elementalist gets up to like 20 new skills per weapon.

This is what makes it so puzzling to me. Not only are ele getting a ton of abilities on every weapon, they even made Weaver have the dual skill mechanic on top of all their attunements. Like, they had time for that, but it's a problem to make a few extra abilities for thief? Even Untamed got a lot of abilities, and things like necro swords are flip abilities. Clearly, it's not an issue to design a ton of abilities, so what is the reason they won't make a new off-hand for thief? I see no reason, it would absolutely be the biggest thing they can do to thief, bringing new life to all the main-hand weapons.

[Kanaima.2546]

21 hours ago, Doggie.3184 said:

Lack of interest. Some things are more fun to work on for developers than others.

But if it helps, Thief Spear has one of the best movesets in game. Only problem is it may not be similar at all on land so we'll have to wait and see what it does.

At the rate they been goin' though it's likely to be our 4th single-target ranged weapon with a super-loud sound effect ina row. 😌

That land spears will use different skills than underwater was the biggest disappointment for me, I love Thief spear underwater and it would've provided a nice defensive option. Judging from the teaser the pessimist (arguably realist in this case,) in me says Thief spear will either be getting "a melee spear skill that rewards careful positioning" or "a set of spear skills that require precise aiming at range," possibly both at the same time if they want to test the water for how sword off-hand would work.

On the more optimistic side, Thief has been getting more love than in the past and had some pretty hefty flaws patched up since Taylor came along, so maybe it'll be one of the more interesting of the teasers and not the typical "here's a massive downside with no real payoff" that Thief has traditionally had in the past.

[vardeleanu.8972]

so exited for staff 2 : electric bungaloo  (or rifle 2, depending on the range)

Edited June 5 by vardeleanu.8972

[Jobber.6348]

On 6/5/2024 at 12:31 AM, Mixchimmer.7230 said:

And Elementalist gets up to like 20 new skills per weapon.

 

just why…?

Engi 🤝Revenant🤝Thief

TOO MANY TWO HANDED WEAPONS

Ele swapping between 4 elements be like "Guys it's balanced what do you mean?" 🤪

 

Edited June 6 by Yasai.3549

[Szymon.5369]

16 hours ago, Rezok.2709 said:

This is what makes it so puzzling to me. Not only are ele getting a ton of abilities on every weapon, they even made Weaver have the dual skill mechanic on top of all their attunements. Like, they had time for that, but it's a problem to make a few extra abilities for thief? 

I wouldn't pull Weaver specifically into this discussion, every dual skill added after initial release was just two skills smooshed together and calling it a day, so Weaver is also somewhat lacking in inspiration - unfortunately, because it's such a cool foundation

[Rezok.2709]

5 minutes ago, Szymon.5369 said:

I wouldn't pull Weaver specifically into this discussion, every dual skill added after initial release was just two skills smooshed together and calling it a day, so Weaver is also somewhat lacking in inspiration - unfortunately, because it's such a cool foundation

I actually think that's a great reason to bring them into the discussion. I mean, the fact that their abilities are uninspired is more a problem with ele in general - there is only so many things you can design an ability to do. Deal some damage, movement or some sort of defense / utility. Ele simply has so many abilities across their weapons that of course they run out of new cool ways to design abilities.

But even despite the fact that ele has so many abilities that they can't even come up with any new, fun, inspired abilities, they still got it. If there is one class that did not require a mechanic to grant them more abilities, it's ele. So it clearly shows that Anet is willing to design a ton of stuff for a single class - which is my point. If it's not an issue of "giving thieves a new off-hand means we have to design new abilities for all main hand weapons", then what is the reason?

I'd honestly love if Anet just told us. It just doesn't make sense to me, seems like such a low hanging fruit to grab by Anet.

[draxynnic.3719]

I think it's actually a problem for ele that since Weaver, ArenaNet hasn't been putting in the effort to make the skills actually good, and has instead been relying on gimmicks to make the weapon feel interesting. Hammer used the orbs mechanic to occupy four of the skill slots, and then pretty much relies on the orbs for its identity - it's a pretty pedestrian melee weapon otherwise (yes, I know some of fire and air technically have range, but you don't actually use it in practice for a number of reasons). Pistol uses the bullet mechanic to try to hide the fact that 9/12 skills on non-weavers are basically "shoot bullet" - and I haven't talked to many people who are game enough to try the complexity layered on complexity on top of even more complexity that is trying to work with the bullets on pistol weaver.

But yeah, it's getting more and more obvious that they've been avoiding making more thief offhands like the plague. It seems, though, that a big part of the motivation is that they don't think an offhand is impactful enough to be the big draw card for players of a profession to buy an expansion. I suspect, though, that they're missing the fact that while that's true for other professions, for thief it absolutely WOULD be a big deal. And even now, it would only require making seven skills (dual skills with five mainhands, plus two skills of its own) which is only one more than a two-handed thief weapon would take, and technically one less than a two-handed thief weapon with an autoattack chain.

[Zacchary.6183]

On 6/5/2024 at 8:54 AM, draxynnic.3719 said:

A condi-only melee weapon might work well.

Hell yeah, another bleed melee!

[roamzero.9486]

5 hours ago, Zacchary.6183 said:

Hell yeah, another bleed melee!

What's funny is that whatever land equivilant for spear that they come up with, it will probably be inferior compared to how broken OP the water version is.

[draxynnic.3719]

1 hour ago, roamzero.9486 said:

What's funny is that whatever land equivilant for spear that they come up with, it will probably be inferior compared to how broken OP the water version is.

Yeah, because they actually care about balance on land...

Heck, we could simplify that statement without compromising accuracy: Yeah, because they actually care about combat on land.

[Bunny.9834]

I have very low faith that they will do something remotely usable for thief based on their track record so far.  

The initiative system is like a curse to these remaining devs and treat the thief like an open sore that they refuse to touch. 

 

We'll see. 

[Rezok.2709]

6 hours ago, Bunny.9834 said:

I have very low faith that they will do something remotely usable for thief based on their track record so far.  

The initiative system is like a curse to these remaining devs and treat the thief like an open sore that they refuse to touch. 

 

We'll see. 

I'm curious as to what track record you are referring to? What exactly about our previous weapons do you consider to not be usable?

From a perspective of viability, all four weapons we have gotten currently have meta builds. Rifle is literally the second highest benchmark weapon in the game right now, but even the other three are sitting in the 40k or more bracket.

From a pure design perspective staff gave us something thieves notoriously lacked; power AoE. Rifle likewise gave us something we didn't have, a way to deal long range power dps.

Scepter gave us the second big thing thieves lacked; a support weapon. It then additionally gives us a way to deal ranged condi damage.

And lastly, axe gave us a way to deal condi damage at range - the only thing that really overlapped with something we already had (scepter). But even so, they managed to give it a playstyle where you use all abilities (scepter is just spamming 1 ability for condi, because it is designed as a support weapon).

So far every weapon thief received have filled out big holes in our kit and every weapon is currently used in meta builds. You might not personally enjoy all the weapons (I hate scepter, for example), but the track record for thief weapon is arguably one of the best in the game.

The big issue with thief weapons isn't actually with the weapons we get, it's with the one thing we don't get - a new off hand. We all know that is needed, but the lack of a new off hand doesn't devalue what we did get.

[draxynnic.3719]

1 hour ago, Rezok.2709 said:

The big issue with thief weapons isn't actually with the weapons we get, it's with the one thing we don't get - a new off hand. We all know that is needed, but the lack of a new off hand doesn't devalue what we did get.

Well, technically speaking, every mainhand would have another option if we had another offhand, therefore the lack of an offhand is de facto devaluing not only sceptre and axe but sword, dagger, and pistol too.

Still, it is a valid point that all of the new weapons have their functions. I'm not such a fan of axe myself while I do like sceptre, but I don't believe every new addition needs to be personally customised to my own preferences.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

On 6/5/2024 at 5:46 AM, BobbyT.7192 said:

They really seem to avoid off hand weapons like the plague.

Don't worry. Warrior picked up that slack.

[Codename T.2847]

Ok not to sound like I have victim-complex here, but... Ele might have a lot of skills, and get a lot too, chances are it will probably end up mid like always xD

Sc/F to Eles is what D/P is to thieves, at the end of the day, the one and only one weaponset worth picking (Speaking from mainly WvW and probably PvP perspective) 

Edited June 7 by Codename T.2847

[draxynnic.3719]

1 hour ago, Codename T.2847 said:

Ok not to sound like I have victim-complex here, but... Ele might have a lot of skills, and get a lot too, chances are it will probably end up mid like always xD

Sc/F to Eles is what D/P is to thieves, at the end of the day, the one and only one weaponset worth picking (Speaking from mainly WvW and probably PvP perspective) 

Most of open world you typically default to sceptre as well, although warhorn probably wins as the offhand over focus (focus still isn't a bad choice in open world, though). Giving up range is something that gets very inconvenient in many areas, staff is reliant on enemies staying still, and pistol is, well, pistol.

I think sPvP is a bit more open in that respect, though. PvP doesn't punish elementalist going into melee range nearly as much as WvW zergs do - you can actually rely on resustain somewhat to stay alive against one or two opponents, and in sPvP you usually can't kite as much while still contesting a point as you can on many WvW objectives.

[Dusk.4708]

Spear is prob gonna have the Ranger smoke assault, I mean Revenant unrelenting assault, I mean evade frame attack from water spear 5 on land now, calling it rn.

Edited June 7 by Dusk.4708

[Voodoo.3201]

Ranger new thief

[mirage.8046]

Dual wield skills? Anet be like 'we don't care to devote ourselves to making those skills.' It took them NINE years to make dual-wield skills with EoD. Endless Night was so sweet on release. 
All that axe does is copy both scepter and pistol with the condi damage, although axe is more for hitting crowds of enemies. I'll respect that axe does lots of juicy burst damage for both power and condi builds. Spear however is so powerful underwater esp if a DD or DE is using it. Imagine if it retains the block on land...