Deadeye and WvW - What role do you see it holding?

[MaxwellM.2075]

I can't see it being a great set for roaming because of the lack of mobility and I'm not sure where it would fit in with a zerg.Perhaps roaming with a small team to help set you up and help finish runners?Maybe in the back line of a Zerg picking off stragglers but also not taking a knee?What are your thoughts and planned builds?

[Jinks.2057]

Deadeye is going to be extremely viable in both WvW & PvP.

In WvW the Deadeye can zerg surf using rifle and pick ppl off w/ ease. It can also roam b/c you can spec it for absurd stealth upkeep or more mobility.

[saerni.2584]

Maybe not in a Zerg. But I'd used it for roaming and picking off reinforcements. The stealth alone will make it highly effective at keeping pressure on the enemy in their territory.

[Zacchary.6183]

The Deadeye has access to group buffing through Peripheral Vision and has enough damage/crit chance bonuses and buffs to make full zerk not an option.

[kash.9213]

I played about the same way I normally do. I mess around with traits and weapon sets a lot but I don't like messing around with gear unless I have to so I still used my usual Marauders/Valk/Zerk/whatever depending on where I need numbers and Scholar runes. DE design wants you to use cantrips but I felt the most out of step using Shadow Flare instead of Shadowstep or not having Shortbow 5. Apart from that I still floated around and found myself at the familiar checkpoints during a fight.

I'll likely do DE 2-1-2 when I'm floating on my own to take out squad drivers, siege, whatever. I'll likely have DE 3-3-3 in large squads as a boon mill. Not much changed in my game play as far as role, mostly small considerations in distance and cast times.

[Zin.6170]

I don't know, but the trait that sends copies of ally conditions to foes around the marked target is going to be fun. Especially since you can almost spam it. Then you can just rifle off the conditions with the retreat.

[lkilian.1854]

People says it won't work very well in zergs, but I disagree. Althought stacking with your allies isn't the best way to go, I can totally see a group of deadeyes attacking specific targets from the side to give their zerg a little advantage downing some enemies.

[CitizenKing.4912]

People keep talking about taking a knee like it has a five second cast time. It's an instant cast move, same as unlocking yourself. Apply a mark, poke at them with 1, then 5, 4, 5 and keep going. It's really not that bad.

[ich.7086]

@CitizenKing.4912 said:People keep talking about taking a knee like it has a five second cast time. It's an instant cast move, same as unlocking yourself. Apply a mark, poke at them with 1, then 5, 4, 5 and keep going. It's really not that bad.

Kneel isn't instant cast, it has a 0,5s cast time.

I think the problem with DE is that the Mark against every tool the todays thief is using :

• Recasting it on the same target makes you loose malice so you want to wait for the full duration to use the +5/7 malice making all the on Steal traits way less impactful
• Long cast time (for thief) makes it harder to use as an interrupt (with SoH), way too easy to dodge (landing Steal is key to win duels or fights in general) making on Steal again harder to benefit from and impossible to use as combo like Staff 2+Steal or Basilic + Steal + Backstab and making less room for mindgame like baiting dodge and stealing on the frame after.
• Mark doesn't port you which make melee really clunky, i felt Sword pretty much mandatory for melee DE and even then it felt bad : you can't Mark-Backstab/CnD/PW/LS/whatever which is really a hard hit on melee set and make me thinks it wasn't meant to melee (Note: i didn't test d/p DE but maybe ShadowShot can make it work)
• Stolen boons aren't design to really help you in the fight, they are meant to be used with Peripheral Vision and/or Fire for Effect for the support and doesn't offer as much depth or raw power than ecto or ranger water field.

That's a lot for a thief to give up on solo roaming for a bit of range, damage up, a nice amount of offensive support and more stealth. That's why i would better see it in roaming/havoc group like a corruption necro but on the power side. On the plus side, it has higher range, more burst and more self sustain with stealth and mobility (since it's a thief anyway and either SB or ShadowStep is likely to be used) so you don't have to babysit it. On the less side, it has trouble against projectile hate (since you won't melee with that) and have access to less boon removal/corruption (which might be covered by Spellbreaker/Scourge). Unforgiving and Binding Shadow (but the castime + delay are so sad) are amazing tools to play with.

For zerg play, the only problems are that the boon given by Peripheral Vision are only around you which is pretty bad since you want to range and you don't have the DD sustain for going melee in zerg and the lack of pierce that allow you to actually hit your target and you know make use of Malice. You can't have a pure dps role in zerg since DE has no cleave (Shadow Flare doesn't count it's trash compared to nec wells) so you need to support a bit or go focus party to earn your place. Futhermore there is the fact that you may want to mark a target (let's say a rev for resistance) but burst an another (let's say a staff ele) so you will have to either :

• mark rev, spam the stolen skill then burst the ele (bad damage since malice only increases your damage against the marked target)
• mark rev, spam the stolen skill then use Mercy to mark ele then burst him (waste 1 utility slot)
• mark rev, spam stolen skill then burst him and hope to kill him fast (with no pierce so good luck) to have mark recharge and then use mark on ele and burst him (unreliable and wasted damage)
• mark ele then burst him and hope to kill it fast to have mark recharge and then you can mark rev and spam stolen skill to do your support job (unreliable and delayed support)

So it may work but i'm not good enough in zerg play to say if it's viable or not (the focus party part may be super fun).

[Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497]

For WvW, Roaming, Defending, Holding Choke Points, killing gliders, +1ingFor PvP, everything that a core thief can do, plus being extremely good at team fighting while being surprisingly tanky. You can get 40% damage reduction against a single target in stealth while not being able to be critically hit in stealth. OR you can get 25% damage reduction outside of stealth against targets without boons, AND 50% damage reduction in stealth. Fuck your 4,500 crit I got percentile damage reduction.

[ich.7086]

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:For WvW, Roaming, Defending, Holding Choke Points, killing gliders, +1ing+1ing doesn't exist in WvW as it is in PvP : it's basicly solo roaming without the ability to 1v1 which is awfulI would take DD on solo roaming over DE every day i want to play something that works against decent players.

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:For PvP, everything that a core thief can do, plus being extremely good at team fighting while being surprisingly tanky. You can get 40% damage reduction against a single target in stealth while not being able to be critically hit in stealth. OR you can get 25% damage reduction outside of stealth against targets without boons, AND 50% damage reduction in stealth. kitten your 4,500 crit I got percentile damage reduction.If you want to kill the ele you will mark the ele and your damage reduction from Iron Sight will only works against the ele damage which isn't much help against the bazillions AoE damage put by dh/necro/engie/war/rev/.... And DE is worse than core thief (or even DD) for melee play since Mark isn't instant nor a teleport so you will have to stick for range damage which ele/engie/necro can and will negate pretty easily.

Stealth doesn't last for ever and the whole damage reduction you get is cool but what are is the point ? You are going to stay on point and tank ? Well SA isn't going to help because you need to not be stealthed to contest node and do damage (the whole point of taking a DE at first). The actual thief teamfighter (staff DD) has a lot of 100% damage reduction (evade) with a high amount of cleave and condi clear and isn't reliant on stealth (so it can contest node and 1v1) or projectile reflection. Even if it has been nerfed hard it's way more effective than any stealth bunker.

[Red Haired Savage.5430]

I think you're going to see allot more driver sniping with DE.

[Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497]

@ich.7086 said:

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:For WvW, Roaming, Defending, Holding Choke Points, killing gliders, +1ing+1ing doesn't exist in WvW as it is in PvP : it's basicly solo roaming without the ability to 1v1 which is awfulI would take DD on solo roaming over DE every day i want to play something that works against decent players.

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:For PvP, everything that a core thief can do, plus being extremely good at team fighting while being surprisingly tanky. You can get 40% damage reduction against a single target in stealth while not being able to be critically hit in stealth. OR you can get 25% damage reduction outside of stealth against targets without boons, AND 50% damage reduction in stealth. kitten your 4,500 crit I got percentile damage reduction.If you want to kill the ele you will mark the ele and your damage reduction from Iron Sight will only works against the ele damage which isn't much help against the bazillions AoE damage put by dh/necro/engie/war/rev/.... And DE is worse than core thief (or even DD) for melee play since Mark isn't instant nor a teleport so you will have to stick for range damage which ele/engie/necro can and will negate pretty easily.

Stealth doesn't last for ever and the whole damage reduction you get is cool but what are is the point ? You are going to stay on point and

tank

? Well SA isn't going to help because you need to not be stealthed to contest node and do damage (the whole point of taking a DE at first). The actual thief

teamfighter

(staff DD) has a lot of 100% damage reduction (evade) with a high amount of cleave and condi clear and isn't reliant on stealth (so it can contest node and 1v1) or projectile reflection. Even if it has been nerfed hard it's way more effective than any stealth bunker.

I haven't had a problem with 1v1ing with Deadeye yet. I've even smashed Daredevils in duels with the spec in the WvW and PvP. You can also look at a number of videos on youtube and see that multiple players never had an issue with 1v1ing. You can use the argument that these players don't know how to use the specs yet. But the same goes for the Deadeye. And there are even players who uses the HoT specs.

You, like many other players on this forum, keep forgetting that deadeye takes on a new play style in general. If you go melee, you need to be fairly good at Core Thief while maintaining target priorities, yes you lack the ability to instantly jump on top of someone with steal. But you can also maintain a decent distance which can still be a benefit as your damage starts ramping. If you decide to keep rifle on, you need to be very mindful about your positioning, and be good at juking. Trying to say that Daredevil is better than Deadeye is conceptually unfair. The two feature completely different functions and playstyles. DD is in your face and keeping the pressure via attacking. DE is the sort who's in no rush and is a demon when he gets some damn good ground - whom pressures people into acting fast.

[ich.7086]

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:I haven't had a problem with 1v1ing with Deadeye yet. I've even smashed Daredevils in duels with the spec in the WvW and PvP.

I've killed people without weapon only with bound + physical skill. That doesn't mean that a weaponless build is good. I have dueled too en DE (with that build) but apart some situations, I felt DD would be more effective (maybe because new to DE).

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:You can also look at a number of videos on youtube and see that multiple players never had an issue with 1v1ing. You can use the argument that these players don't know how to use the specs yet. But the same goes for the Deadeye. And there are even players who uses the HoT specs.

I have yet seen people spamming 3 on rifle, pewpewing with P/P burst and d/p with stealth which isn't something that makes me say "wow such depth". If you got better videos/stream please link I'm really wanting to see somthing that doesn't resolve around one burst trick.

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:You, like many other players on this forum, keep forgetting that deadeye takes on a new play style in general.

I am aware of that. I tried to play it like a core thief and it's basicly the same

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:If you go melee, you need to be fairly good at Core Thief while maintaining target priorities

DE has that notion of commitment that core thief have not. You can only use the stolen skill against the marked target : that means no guard daze to interrupt ele for ez burst, no rev steal on necro. If you switch target you don't benefit from malice at all and you need to recast Mark (0,5s) on target to build up malice which is a huge ramp up time for switching target for oppportunity burst the thief has to look for.

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:, yes you lack the ability to instantly jump on top of someone with steal. But you can also maintain a decent distance which can still be a benefit as your damage starts ramping.If you are in a teamfight/+1, the moment you loose waiting for malice to stack is a moment where you team is playing outnumbered. You want to kill now, not 10s after (at least now, if the meta become tankier maybe it will be worth the wait). The lack of instant port lower a lot the number of tricks a thief can do.

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:If you decide to keep rifle on, you need to be very mindful about your positioning, and be good at juking.

@Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497 said:Trying to say that Daredevil is better than Deadeye is conceptually unfair. The two feature completely different functions and playstyles. DD is in your face and keeping the pressure via attacking. DE is the sort who's in no rush and is a demon when he gets some kitten good ground - whom pressures people into acting fast.

I only said DD is better than DE for roaming in WvW and that DE is even less suited as a teamfighter than DD (which isn't a good teamfighter by itself even in staff) because of the core class. DE is better as different things.

[MaxwellM.2075]

So you just said DE isn't good at roaming (solo) and isn't good at team fights (zerging). So what it is good for then?

[Asur.9178]

@MaxwellM.2075 said:So you just said DE isn't good at roaming (solo) and isn't good at team fights (zerging). So what it is good for then?

DE is best used for roleplaying.

[MaxwellM.2075]

@Asur.9178 said:DE is best used for roleplaying.

Wow, Brutal! Hey Inheaed their shot pierce. That actually helps a lot with group stuff. How does the pierce effect damage? If your firing into a group you could take out several people at once with DE high spike damage.

[Blackari.2051]

So in title you asking about Deadeye, but in text below you are talking about Deadeye with rifle. Why there is so many ppl that think you have to pick new weapon with new spec?But tbh in this case it doesnt matter, DE will be viable in WvW with or without rifle, you wont be playing it like Reaper in front line or as Ele in back line, you will be flanking.And for roaming it is more than viable.

[MaxwellM.2075]

I don't think there are a lot of people who think you Must pick rifle but if your talking about any elite etc in general terms you're probably talking about the entire package. Rifle happens to be a anlarge feature of the DE package.

[ich.7086]

@MaxwellM.2075 said:So you just said DE isn't good at roaming (solo) and isn't good at team fights (zerging). So what it is good for then?Zerg (where I think it's bad) != havoc (10-15) in WvW (where I think it can see some crazy plays)

@ich.7086 said:That's why i would better see it in roaming/havoc group like a corruption necro but on the power side. On the plus side, it has higher range, more burst and more self sustain with stealth and mobility (since it's a thief anyway and either SB or ShadowStep is likely to be used) so you don't have to babysit it. On the less side, it has trouble against projectile hate (since you won't melee with that) and have access to less boon removal/corruption (which might be covered by Spellbreaker/Scourge). Unforgiving and Binding Shadow (but the castime + delay are so sad) are amazing tools to play with.

[Khazik.8052]

@CitizenKing.4912 said:....(bad damage since malice only increases your damage against the marked target)This was not my experience. I was able to mark ambient creatures then blast someone for 30k once I reached max malice.

[Ghotistyx.6942]

For Rifle specifically, I'd run at least 2 styles. Depending on the stolen skills, you might even have a boon support option.

Power Rifle - Pick people off with Kneel'd 4Condi Rifle - Panic Strike and spam 2 for piercing immob and poison.