An Eye on the Deadeye

[DeceiverX.8361]

@Robert Gee.9246

I just want to say I'm happy where these changes are going in terms of the general direction of the Deadeye; the spec will hopefully feel more unified, fun to play, and rewarding when played aggressively when using the rifle. It's also a breath of fresh air to see some sweeping changes to design that isn't fun to play against. I hope to see more of this into the future with other professions as well.

However, I do express some concerns for some kit viability. With the changes to Malice + Stealth attacks, there are going to be obviously superior weapon combinations to play. Of these, Backstab in particular comes to mind given the highlighted disparities between D/D and D/P.

With D/D having no unique innate mobility and no means to acquire stealth beyond already needing to be in melee range for CnD, Deadeye's Mark is rendered almost useless for any D/D build attempting to take advantage of DE's burst potential and design goals shifting towards persistent aggression (which is what D/D is supposed to be about given poor stealth and an evade), particularly in comparison to what D/P offers, for D/P overcomes the problems of both sustaining in-combat via reliable disengage through on-demand stealth as well as resilience via easily-applied blinds for hit denial, as well as mobility via Shadow Shot to nail down moving targets. In the case of D/D, Steal is just necessary mobility today in order to attempt to close out a kill; virtually every other class in the game upon being fully marked has the potential to easily just peel off from this kit, but cannot do so as easily for D/P. Further, classes which elect to stand their ground can also deny D/D's Deadeye synergy through taking defensive postures to block CnD and just kill the thief outright.

I think the moment is now to implement something I've been requesting for years: Make Death Blossom a movement skill - even removing the damage is fine here to prevent issues of spammed damage (and this also helps a thief maintain elusiveness when gaining stealth via CnD without hitting anything) - and move the bleeds elsewhere (HS with stack scaling by % health would be a great candidate). That, or make it like the original version of Death's Charge on the Reaper - a fixed-distance lunge which can overshoot a target and then deals its damage at the end of cast to also deny spam. This can help make D/D condi require a bit more skill to play by exposing it to being vulnerable when dealing damage, and allows for room for growth of the kit itself without making it overpowered, and finally help D/D as a power kit move into a position where it can be considered a usable kit and have synergy with Deadeye. Because right now, D/D is pretty much actively punished for opting in to play Deadeye, and the kit itself is already substantially weaker than others.

[Ohoni.6057]

@Cameryn.5310 said:

@Ohoni.6057 said:Has Kneel been changed to make it more comfortable to stand up yet? I just couldn't get into the idea of having to press a specific button to be able to move, in a game that's very motion-heavy. That's the main thing that keeps me from playing a rifle Deadeye, and without playing a rifle Deadeye, I still don't see a reason to not play a Daredevil, who is WAY more mobile and has a staff.

@Robert.Gee.9246 this is actually one thing I

would

suggest you guys look at. Getting out of kneel stance would be a lot more appealing if it was easier. In fact, it would be amazing if hitting your weapon swap (which is something most of us use muscle memory for) broke you out of kneel stance... Hit once to stand up, hit again to swap weapons. Easy peasy.

I don't know about weapon swap. The problem with rifle is that it's often very hard to tell whether you are kneeling or not, sometimes the button doesn't register, or an attack knocks you out of it, and the split second of figuring that out costs lives. Weapon swap would be nice if you knew that you were kneeling, but if it turned out you just thought you were kneeling, you'd swap weapons and then be on cooldown.

Of all the options I've heard, I think "jump" is the best.

[Sarge shot Grif.6450]

Welp... I'm super mixed on this and I think it will all boil down to how much, if at all, they changed BQoBK.

PS: Since this seems to be a thread that the devs are watching I might as well ask a question I've had for a while now. Whenever you're using a rifle with a unique firing sound and mute them it only plays the rifle 2 sound for all shots instead of their own sounds , is this intended or a bug? I really hope it's a bug that can be fixed because I adore the sound design for the rifle ( both rifle 3 skills for example) and I'd love to have predator shots with all correct sounds.

Also is there a chance for us to get an option to hide unique projectiles (Hope, dreamer, chuka etc) because the projectile effects for deadeye are really nice.

[LadyKitty.6120]

Hmm, interesting. That kind of change helps boonbot deadeye at becoming closer to an accepted option. It'll allow thief to boonbot well by swapping a sigil, runes, foods and a couple traits. If deadeye also gets a slight PVE-damage boost with this (like, changes to malice nerfs passive boost by 5-11% even with the new trait though malice-stealth skills might pay that off and more), there might be use for some other healers. Of course, in optimal situation DE would also have got some damage-related (pref. precision) unique buff. Or Spotter since deadeye is kind of a sniper spec and snipers use a spotter to assign targets and observe the conditions for better accuracy... Anyway, this might be able to bring some options to that cursed druid mightbot meta. (Soulbeasts can bring the spirits, ze.)

So, Kitty made a calc about what future boonbot deadeye would look like, add 12% to that boon duration. http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQJAoYnkFDFOh9FDOOB8PhlxCzbAEAOAbboySHivM2GnjA-jxRBQBXR5HAOBA0Y/B8oHgSq/MxHAgZUCSKgA3VB-eCompared to pure DPS build, this build would have 230 less might (~6% nerf), 5% less damage from ferocity and 5% less damage from strenght vs scholar. And no damage from sigil of air, but still, the damage hit isn't huge compared to boons it brings.

[ReaverKane.7598]

I like the changes, and i'd like to suggest that hitting a movement skill would cancel kneel?As it is now its sometimes the first instinct to try and move, then to remember you're kneeling...Maybe as punishment for the clumsy play add a second or 2 to the cooldown if you cancel it through movement.

[bq pd.2148]

@JasonLucas.4981 said:If I'm not wrong, in some raids we get perma revealed, how are we going to use stealth attacks in those circumstances?

i didnt play my deadeye in raids so far, how exactly does that reveal function? because in WvW there are also 2 types of long reveal: anti stealth trap (i think 20 or 30 seconds) and the sand around earth keep on desert border land (24 hours) both can be overwritten with selfreveal from DJ or removed with shadow meld and they do not pulsate, so if the one in raids also doesnt pulse you maybe can already remove it with shadow meld but then you would lose the 200 power 3s after the stealth attack unless it pulses but slowly in a few second intervalls.i currently only got dhumm id so can try on monday as dhuum doesnt reveal.

---

i wouldnt put my hopes high on deadeye now tho for several reason.the devs said the deadeye is leaning towards stealth play so we sync malice system with stealth attacks wich is a nice approach if they would make it a ranged build to quickly go in and out of stealth like a ranged d/d thief.but then then they say we removed the silent scope and put the defense from it into a barrier skill. so we lost stealth access from rifle weapon skills - awesome now that we have to go into stealth!thats not all tho malice gain shouldnt be passive so we get that if we hit our marked target with a skill that costs initative and we only get 1 malice per skill no matter the cost and up to 1 additonal malice if a hit of that skill hits critically. thats alot of conditions to gain malice:

• skills that do not hit wont grant malice, so kneeling will drain ini without malice gain, shortbow 5 often also wont grant malice, infiltrators return is also no malice but ini spent.
• we only get malice for hitting the marked target wich is understandable but removes a nice strategy i often used in 1 vs 2 in WvW, marking one shooting at the other with rifle stuff to get them optimally down till malice is up and then quick DJ oneshot the marked, who is not playing defensively at that time as he is not being pressured. i will miss that.
• ini is a passively over time generated resource that we need to spent now in order to get malice because this way malice is no longer generated passively over time , yeah... would be too easy if AA or stolen skills could aswell grant malice. and even worse we even would have some spare ini left then to actually go into stealth to use the malice. stealth heavy builds using SA, be it stealth DE or bound DD or some D/D variant use most of their ini purely to go into stealth either repeatedly or for extended periods, they do not waste much ini for other stuff. with that new concept tho we got to drain all our ini to attack the opponent and then we cant go into stealth unless with long CD utilities. i dont see how deadeye is then leaning towards stealth play, i rather play daredevil for that then.
• ini cost of the skill doesnt matter for the amount of malice, so because thieves allways lack ini we are encouraged to spamm low ini skills instead of what we actually need in that situation if we want to utilitze the malice and even then its too expensive.

so i dont really think the new malice system is great, unless malice gain is boosted ALOT by traits or stealth attacks are absolutly OP.they stated this change is more for the mechanical side of deadeye and not the DPS therefor i dont think DE will be relevant in that regard after the patch as it currently is only medium and that with harsh restrictions of single target only and rooted 24/7 while we got those 2 restrictions we would need to be nr 1. single target DPS to maybe be welcomed as a DPS in high end PvE. but that is not going to happen.i also dont see any unique support abilities comming our way so, i guess i have to keep playing mesmer in PvE - tho i would really prefer to be useful and welcomed on my thieves.

if anet wants DE to go in and out of stealth with malice system, then we might aswell need a change to the SA traitline. because IMO the most important traits in there for defense Shadows Embrace, Resilliance of Shadows, Shadows Rejuvenation and Cloaked in Shadows are all favoring stealth camping over in and out playstyle. condition remove , heal , ini gain, damage reduction and crit immunity is constant while in stealth and not granted for entering and leaving stealth. shadows protector, rending shade and the blind part of cloaked in shadows are on entering / leaving stealth but they are simply too weak in comparison.

all in all if we dont get like really strong traits for easy stealth access, faster malice gain, more damage/support, (hopefully unblockable buff!)- i dont see how DE will be any good afterwards.

therefor my suggestion as a change to the already announced stuff :i would suggest 1 malice for a ini skill, another malice if it hits and a 3rd if crit. then you still need at least 6 ini to get a 5 malice DJ ready and then you are still not stealthed to actually use it, it would require active skill usage still but it wouldnt further limit us in our actions and ini usage. we just would need a way to go into stealth then with rifle without using a long CD utility, unless that barrier skill also grants stealth or barrier to allies and stealth to the deadeye.then i could calmly await the change. but without stealth access on rifle and such a bad malice gain i simply dont think the traits will be good enough.oh and remove ini cost from kneel then so it is not abused for malice stacking, that 1/2 cast time while standing still + 10s cooldown is already enough for that cleanse and you cant even use kneel if you get immobilized while moving in some cases.

[Volrath.1473]

Ok. First of all congratulations! After all this time you guys finally admitted that DE is a poor elite specialization. And I quoteMalice Complexity - Malice gain rules are obscure and don't allow much interaction from the Deadeye.Rifle Flexibility - Rifle optimal damage combos are bland and the weapon lacks adaptability.Trait Synergies - Minor traits fight with each other and there aren't strong choices at some tiers.

Secondly why would you encourage thieves not to use their stealth skills by depleting all malice? I play S/D and I will never use the stealth skill again if this comes to be. I have many wais of gaining endurance, why would I sacrifice DPS for a meaningless amount of endurance? That makes no sense at all...

I can't understand the reason for giving the deadeye a shield ability wile kneeling. I thought you were making us more versatile not encouraging camping and being self-rooted playstyle...

DJ a stealth ability? why? So that we can't land a single DJ? Why not give it a new sound effect like someone shouting "DODGE NOW" cuz obviously that's what will happen every time a deadeye stealths in the middle of combat. All the malice will be depleted and we'll miss you he shot.

Were better of the way we are now...

[Kageseigi.2150]

@Fierlor.2697 said:At least we have our mobility gents....they can't take that away from us.

Ah, didn't you hear? Shortbow 5 is being changed into a spammable Scorpion Wire. At least this version works ;-)

[Chameleon Dude.1564]

@Robert Gee.9246 said:

@Cameryn.5310 said:Please tell me that we aren't going to lose that and be forced to play Deadeye spec with rifles. Please. I don't want to go back to that. In PVE, I

never

do more damage with the rifle than the pistol, because circumstances where I can safely kneel and hit things with my rifle are few and far between, but with dual pistols I'm hitting things every second.While I can't speak to your exact build, I personally find P/P Deadeye to be just as good or better with these changes.

I feel a bit better after reading this, but still uneasy. I get that these changes are trying to make stealth more relevant (forced) to deadeyes and attempt to make a support build appealing in raids (chrono/druid/banner warrior/firebrand exist, so this won't happen); but wouldn't these changes be better suited as something you trait into, rather than a forced mechanic? Want to be a stealthy sniper? Pick the traits for it. Want to be a boon bot? Pick the traits for it? Want to have a decent damage boost from malice, without requiring tons of stealth or 10-man squad boons? That's why we have three rows of traits.

Hoping that these changes will be fun and a huge improvement, but it still just sounds like we're being shoehorned into spamming stealth or playing a role that's only useful in raids and raiders won't want us for.

[Blocki.4931]

@"Volrath.1473" said:Ok. First of all congratulations! After all this time you guys finally admitted that DE is a poor elite specialization. And I quoteMalice Complexity - Malice gain rules are obscure and don't allow much interaction from the Deadeye.Rifle Flexibility - Rifle optimal damage combos are bland and the weapon lacks adaptability.Trait Synergies - Minor traits fight with each other and there aren't strong choices at some tiers.

Secondly why would you encourage thieves not to use their stealth skills by depleting all malice? I play S/D and I will never use the stealth skill again if this comes to be. I have many wais of gaining endurance, why would I sacrifice DPS for a meaningless amount of endurance? That makes no sense at all...

I can't understand the reason for giving the deadeye a shield ability wile kneeling. I thought you were making us more versatile not encouraging camping and being self-rooted playstyle...

DJ a stealth ability? why? So that we can't land a single DJ? Why not give it a new sound effect like someone shouting "DODGE NOW" cuz obviously that's what will happen every time a deadeye stealths in the middle of combat. All the malice will be depleted and we'll miss you he shot.

Were better of the way we are now...

"waste malice" since you can acquire it FAR easier and it doesn't contribute to your damage anymore I don't think you can waste it at all. Instead you get the choice of how and when you're going to use it.

[LadyKitty.6120]

@"Gaile Gray.6029" said:A message from Robert Gee, Guild Wars 2 Systems Team:

Strike from the Shadows

Now that we've gone over the new way that malice is gained, let's talk about the new way that it is used.

Stealth attacks will consume all your current malice when striking your mark to grant bonus effects based on the amount of malice consumed. The actual bonus per consumed malice differs per skill but let's use the sword stealth attack as an example.

Malicious Tactical Strike: If this attack hits your mark, it consumes all malice to regenerate endurance for each malice consumed.

Each stealth attack has a different bonus based on the type of skill it is. Skills primarily focused around damage, such as Backstab, will consume malice for bonus damage whereas skills focused around condition damage, such as Sneak Attack, will consume malice for bonus condition effects. Tactical Strike on the other hand consumes malice to grant an advantage over your enemy via endurance gain.

We decided to tie the malice consumption to stealth for a few reasons. First, we felt that stealth was a solid core mechanic that touched every single thief weapon and had many synergies through core traits and skills. Thief players already understand stealth attacks so this allows malice spending to be an upgrade to an established system rather than an entirely new one. Finally, the Deadeye was already leaning towards being a stealth-based character due to its elite skill Shadow Meld and utility skill Shadow Gust, so we felt that having malice slot into the stealth attack was a natural fit.

Hmm, Kitty started thinking... Since malice will be bound to stealth attacks, will pistol 5 be changed into something that provides stealth by itself, not through field? Because relying on pistol 5's smoke field it quite useless in PVE group content since they get instantly overwritten by other fields and thus lack of reliable stealth source would push any x+p builds into even worse position PVE-wise (read: obsolete).As of now, pistol+pistol in PVE only works for light CC and spamming unload (Some kind of hard-hitting "Point Blank"-stealth attack with 180 range would make stealth useful for pistol).Sword+pistol in PVE is literally auto-attack build with minor CC from Headshot due to Pistol Whip's long initiation+casting time (Kitty tested it after Feb 6th balance patch and Mark+Shadow Flare+auto-attacking did 24267 and using Pistol Whip did 23483). Current damage modifier for sword's Tactical Strike-stealth attack also makes it only good for CC as of now in PVE. So Tactical Strike could really use some modifier modulation to be worth using in PVE.And then we have dagger+pistol, which is in similar situation as sword+pistol due to lack of stealth required for Backstabbing.

Kitty just wishes there were more alternatives for power thief builds and adding short (even 2 secs would be enough) direct stealth to pistol 5 would open a lot more options. It wouldn't really conflict with dagger 5 either as dagger 5 is kind of a hard-hitter while pistol 5 hits does almost 0 damage as a trade-off for the benefit of extra CC on pistol 4. With Trickery's Quick Pockets-trait, it would even make weapon swapping of d/d and d/p a considerable option.

[oac.6809]

i'm extremely excited about these changes. i just started playing my deadeye again recently and was reminded why i stopped really playing him in the first place

this from a PVE perspective, but Robert's itemised list is very close to what made Deadeye kind of fall short for me, especially the traits not synergising well

i'm glad that malice is being represented more outside of rifle

i'm really happy to see a trait that boosts concentration and rewards boon building/sharing because i played a Critical Strikes / Trickery / Deadeye that picked up all the traits for gaining boons on using steal/mark. it was a very fun style of playing and made me really wish for Seekers stats in PVE.i also hope they did something to fix Perfectionist though. the last round of changes, while great overall for helping keep deadeye smoother to play when fighting bigger targets by letting you refresh your mark and preserve your malice stacks, broke Perfectionist for these situations, only giving you boons once per fight unless you hard-reset your malice

i really hope the changes to rifle address the lack of AOE options. hopefully we get some more piercing, a ricochet, or a ranged aoe

i can see some concern about malice consumption being tied to stealth attacks, but i think people glossed over the bonus damage for malice being tied to traits now. it seems to me that there will be a trait to reward stealthy deadeyes and one that will instead reward deadeyes who just want to build up malice and not want to necessarily consume it regularly. that understanding could be totally wrong too, but i think it's a bit too early to claim success or failure on these changes since they aren't comprehensive.

[Raemyi.2968]

After trying the deadeye out, I was so enamored by the profession that I spent several months replaying all content with a fresh thief. It was the most fun I've had with GW2 for a long time, and these changes make me rather afraid that everything I love about deadeye is about to disappear.

The rifle weapon feels powerful, one of the only ranged options in the game that does, and even so it's the sort of weapon you can't use without being snickered at by other players. I can't imagine any possible scenario in which the proposed changes to Death's Judgement won't be a tremendous DPS loss for the weapon, and we're already belittled by the community for being weak as a DPS profession when using a rifle. I'll put it simply: Death's Judgement is our bread-and-butter. It's our Hundred Blades. If you take it away (and stealth-only truly feels like it may as well not exist) then what's left? Auto attacks? Spamming Three Round Burst? Giving up and going with a melee weapon? I'm just not seeing the light at the end of the tunnel with this one.

Be Quick or Be Killed was also mentioned, though in passing. I'm legitimately terrified that we'll lose our ability to stack quickness, too. If both of those go, then what's even left of deadeye's original capabilities?

I want to believe that you wouldn't just nerf our damage output by upwards of 50% or something crazy, but in my limited capacity to understand this game's math, it really, really feels like that's what's going to happen. I hope to be proven wrong. I want to still be able to play the profession I fell in love with in more than just name alone. :/

[Rajani Isa.6294]

@"Volrath.1473" said:DJ a stealth ability? why? So that we can't land a single DJ? Why not give it a new sound effect like someone shouting "DODGE NOW" cuz obviously that's what will happen every time a deadeye stealths in the middle of combat. All the malice will be depleted and we'll miss you he shot.

Were better of the way we are now...

if you read the dev posts they do state malice stays on a miss

[Elxdark.9702]

@"Volrath.1473" said:Ok. First of all congratulations! After all this time you guys finally admitted that DE is a poor elite specialization. And I quoteMalice Complexity - Malice gain rules are obscure and don't allow much interaction from the Deadeye.Rifle Flexibility - Rifle optimal damage combos are bland and the weapon lacks adaptability.Trait Synergies - Minor traits fight with each other and there aren't strong choices at some tiers.

Secondly why would you encourage thieves not to use their stealth skills by depleting all malice? I play S/D and I will never use the stealth skill again if this comes to be. I have many wais of gaining endurance, why would I sacrifice DPS for a meaningless amount of endurance? That makes no sense at all...

I can't understand the reason for giving the deadeye a shield ability wile kneeling. I thought you were making us more versatile not encouraging camping and being self-rooted playstyle...

DJ a stealth ability? why? So that we can't land a single DJ? Why not give it a new sound effect like someone shouting "DODGE NOW" cuz obviously that's what will happen every time a deadeye stealths in the middle of combat. All the malice will be depleted and we'll miss you he shot.

Were better of the way we are now...

Again.

People don't know how to read at all.You will stack malice way way way FASTER than before a single skill from your weapon set will give you 1 plus 1 if it crits, so getting malice will be pretty easy.Robert already said you will only lose the malice if you hit, if you miss your malice won't go off.Imo the bonus attacks are just that a simple bonus, the main thing is the new malice system which will be million better than what we have now.

I see a lot of people crying about CB being removed but at least in pvp the skill was so bugged that it was really hard to land it, not only because the extremely slow projectile but also because it has a LOT of spots where you will get los bugs. However I see the worry for the only unblockable skill rifle had but if you tell me we will have DJ instead then... I'd gladly take DJ.

Also they said the effects from CB will be in one of the utility skills (cantrips)

[Stinja.9612]

This honestly sounds horrible, there's far too many times "big moves" are obstructed by nothing and shadow gust is a terrible skill that is why its not used same with Mercy. It has nothing to do with malice scaling, period and everything to do with poorly made skills vs whats already available and a serious lack of understanding how the classes play in places like WvW. Looks like the only pof elite spec i liked is going to be garbage now in the only game mode i enjoyed, Great....

[Vegeta.2563]

@Evil Crimson Soul.5784 said:To be fair I've always played as a thief and I always wanted more out of dead eye, I think this is the push I need to move from daredevil to dead eye now, good update guys!!!:D

I think the only thing keeping people on Daredevil at this point is the choice of different dodge skills.. and of course the use of staff.

[Jora.5471]

@Robert Gee.9246

Is stealth the only way to effectively use deadeye's malice because of stealth attacks? I really like P/P deadeye because I didn't need to have stealth mechanics to spam unload all the time.

[EteariusS.3602]

Dear Anet, when i play deadeye, I'm forced to bring two signets to be competitive in PvE. There are classes where they cleave up to 5 targets with the same firepower without a signet (passive) enhancement. That being said, deadeye cant do even do 80% of that dmg to a single target without equipping two signets, which i find as a design flaw.

Ok in PvP, thief already is gimped (idc how many people disagree with me). Before HoT, thief was skills and can fight 2v1 as long as the risk outweighed the firepower it was providing (can trade blows with even blocking guardian), now its out of whack as the only time you can commit is when an opponent is facing their back on you and preoccupied with something else (cant trade blows as risk is often not worth it). Now with the introduction of deadeye, this became rather unrealistic. The only class that rotates the most and fights offpoint is gimped with less mobility and halfassed dmg (same two signet discussion) which in PvP, utilities are meant to bring interesting mechanics on the table to weigh the cost of dmg but such is not the case today.

Thank you for your consideration

[MicROpart.7905]

am I the only one think that this change is make deadeye alot useless now? the class called deadeye, using rifle as sniper rifle, whic the point is to "kill fast as posible, without drawing to much attention" now they change the malice to only generate if u hit them, whic taking much more more more time to kill.. dahell? better scrap the name "deadeye" and change it to something else like, "I'll poke u first so I can kill u", I'm sorry but i have to say this is ridiculous..

[DeceiverX.8361]

@"MicROpart.7905" said:am I the only one think that this change is make deadeye alot useless now? the class called deadeye, using rifle as sniper rifle, whic the point is to "kill fast as posible, without drawing to much attention" now they change the malice to only generate if u hit them, whic taking much more more more time to kill.. dahell? better scrap the name "deadeye" and change it to something else like, "I'll poke u first so I can kill u", I'm sorry but i have to say this is ridiculous..

Not everyone wanted the Deadeye to be something that camped stealth. Permastealth + Nuke is unhealthy design and makes for horrendously boring gameplay for a majority of people.

[Ashgar.3024]

Interesting changes but from a PvP perspective, tying Stealth to our "nuke" is a bit risky for the overall health of the game imo, people don't tend to enjoy being oneshot "out of nowhere". The old Death's Judgement had enough telegraph to allow people with decent awareness to react to it, the new one might feel cheesy.

Also, any plans to look at our Cantrips? Some feel very underwhelming or situational at best. Mercy being very high on that list (at least again, from a PvP perspective, i don't know if PvERs use it).

[Ohoni.6057]

@Vegeta.2563 said:

@Evil Crimson Soul.5784 said:To be fair I've always played as a thief and I always wanted more out of dead eye, I think this is the push I need to move from daredevil to dead eye now, good update guys!!!:D

I think the only thing keeping people on Daredevil at this point is the choice of different dodge skills.. and of course the use of staff.

Which is everything.

[bq pd.2148]

@DeceiverX.8361 said:

@"MicROpart.7905" said:am I the only one think that this change is make deadeye alot useless now? the class called deadeye, using rifle as sniper rifle, whic the point is to "kill fast as posible, without drawing to much attention" now they change the malice to only generate if u hit them, whic taking much more more more time to kill.. dahell? better scrap the name "deadeye" and change it to something else like, "I'll poke u first so I can kill u", I'm sorry but i have to say this is ridiculous..

Not everyone wanted the Deadeye to be something that camped stealth. Permastealth + Nuke is unhealthy design and makes for horrendously boring gameplay for a majority of people.

sure for many it might be boring but :

@Gaile Gray.6029 said:We decided to tie the malice consumption to stealth for a few reasons. First, we felt that stealth was a solid core mechanic that touched every single thief weapon and had many synergies through core traits and skills. Thief players already understand stealth attacks so this allows malice spending to be an upgrade to an established system rather than an entirely new one. Finally, the Deadeye was already leaning towards being a stealth-based character due to its elite skill Shadow Meld and utility skill Shadow Gust, so we felt that having malice slot into the stealth attack was a natural fit.

so one of their reasons for those changes is because deadeye is leaning towards being stealthed based. with those changes tho at least in WvW many of my opponent would be dead before i am at full malice, because i only get malice if the attack actually hits. and then when i used all my ini i need to find a way to get into stealth to oh yeah suprise my opponent with the shot, we really needed another tell. but it will be interesting to get into stealth as i probably need to use a utility as (if i understood correctly) they will remove stealth from rifle.so how is that a playstyle leaning towards stealth? if it was at least designed to go in and out of stealth frequently, but you dont want to go into stealth untill your malice is up or you get a low stealth attack.i simply dont get how they imagine a deadeye will fight then. using stealth attacks and using all your ini for malice gen IMO is creating a conflict in resource use. as said above: builds that rely on stealth be it a in and out style or camping will still use most ini on going into stealth and not for attacking. for instance with SA and bound you often will go BP-> bound -> BS -> mainly AA -> BP -> bound etc. you will use most ini to cast BP and left over for SS or HeadS but far less then for those two then a build running DA over SA.

[DeceiverX.8361]

There's absolutely nothing wrong with stealth-based play.

There's absolutely something wrong with play that revolves around sitting invisible and doing nothing but that for minutes on end and then one-shotting someone, with free escapes on a failed attempt.

The nature of the changes support weaving in and out of stealth if using it heavily and using Meld proactively, and will cause players to need to be able to sustain themselves by not solely relying on stealth to stay alive.

Basically to use stealth as a positional tool and target break to set up for subsequent damage or safety as originally intended.A DE integrating stealth into its play would do something like:Stealth (Meld 1 maybe) -> Reposition -> Expend initiative, utilities, etc. for some pressure per a normal fight -> Stealth (Meld 2) -> Execute target.

We still lack information on the exact changes which will be made, and I hope there are some tweaks to some of the rifle's skills in terms of their initiaive costs to account for the fact that it will require these expenditures. That said, I think the approach to gameplay patterns is a healthier one. The current iteration of SA DE just feels awful to play against and is generally extremely binary in how it performs. It's why I think SA could also use a rework in general, but small steps.