Thief Has Too Much Blind Spam

[Twilight Tempest.7584]

1 hour ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

Keep in mind I am not talking about normal DP Daredevils. As I said in my original post, people are beginning to use this build that went into circulation because of the player "Prince Ali Baba" from NA. People are copy/pasting his method. It's a strangely bunkery Daredevil with lower damage and a lot more sustain, that abuses the large radius of blind pits on side nodes as well as all of the other blinds he has. Few builds are able to stay on the node without sacrificing it for survival vs. this build. It's too strong in side node conquest play. What he is doing is not a normal DPS + build, it's a side node decap duelist.

 

Are thieves not allowed to be "side node decap duelist[s]"?

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

52 minutes ago, Twilight Tempest.7584 said:

 

Are thieves not allowed to be "side node decap duelist[s]"?

It's perfectly fine that a Thief is a side node duelist.

 

What isn't fine is when any class has found a build structure that excels so greatly at this job role that it is able to hard counter the majority of other classes/builds by putting them into a situation where there actually isn't any counter play due to the sheer attribute tied strengths of the dominant build and the lack of mechanics on behalf of the other builds to be able to deal with it.

 

I mean this has entered a realm that is akin to Core Ranger before Marks & Pet nerfs where there were only a couple other builds in the game that could even contest a node and hold a cap against it.

 

And this isn't even to mention that Thief is always still the fastest rotation, which makes all of this too loaded.

Edited May 2, 2021 by Trevor Boyer.6524

[Bast.7253]

2 hours ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

 

I have been playing Thief lately actually. This is a large reason why I did realize blind spam with Smoke Screen is big cheese carry. This skill is virtually a 7s invuln when used in the right situation. Furthermore it's as good as or better than Shadow Refuge when used in conjunction with team mates who actually assist with their leaps and blasts when you drop it. 7s is a LONG time to allow stealth prebuffing. It is also strong at stopping teammates from being cleaved. This skill does too much.

 

What I found is that without Smoke Screen, I'm a bad g2 Thief. But with Smoke Screen, I can go 1v1 and kill P+ players in the same way I would on my Ranger, just by riding them with perma blind spam. Make of it what you want.

 

But what you said there about Warrior weapon swapping for cleanse, is the entire point of my post. Cleansing a blind rarely matters when you're standing in a blind pit that reapplies blind every 1s. And when you're not standing the blind pit, you're still getting ranged blind spam on you + a plethora of CC interrupt play against you, then it hops on top of you and starts spamming blind pits that generate 1s blind pulse again.

 

It's too much blinding man. 7/9 classes in the game do not possess the type of attack/defense mechanics to deal with a constant 1s blind reapplication pulse.

 

Keep in mind I am not talking about normal DP Daredevils. As I said in my original post, people are beginning to use this build that went into circulation because of the player "Prince Ali Baba" from NA. People are copy/pasting his method. It's a strangely bunkery Daredevil with lower damage and a lot more sustain, that abuses the large radius of blind pits on side nodes as well as all of the other blinds he has. Few builds are able to stay on the node without sacrificing it for survival vs. this build. It's too strong in side node conquest play. What he is doing is not a normal DPS + build, it's a side node decap duelist.

 

If I run into him tonight I'll stream it and post it.

 

 

Nah, that's the one I was referring to as the pistol pistol daredevil bounding dodger build.

And yeah, the build is cancer. But he's clearly practiced it a lot to be successful with it and I haven't seen anyone else using this build in a while. Maybe it's more prevalent higher up in the board but I imagine there has to be something that's decent at countering it. 

It's great in 1v1's but I imagine other than trolling in the arena or side-noding it's probably only as successful as the person using it and their decision making on what caps to take. Not saying you're wrong that it feels like it's exploitive, but I haven't seen anyone but him and maybe one or two others running that build over the past couple of years and I'd have to think it's probably not that big of a threat in actual matches. 

Scourge or anything with a lot of ground targeted aoe would probably counter it. And yeah, I fought him the other day and couldn't figure out where the damage was coming from because he wasn't stacking that many conditions? I assume it was the life steal on blind that combined with a few bleeds and direct pistol attacks that did the damage, but the lack of counterplay was a bit frustrating. 

I just think there are bigger fish to fry atm. Like Holo being able to reset 4 times during a fight or reapers seemingly having endless lifeforce, countless teleport abilities, and insane damage. 

I mean, necro in general. The fact that they thought necro was in a good place and every match has at least 4 necros is a pretty good indication that there's something wrong... 

Edited May 2, 2021 by Bast.7253

[Twilight Tempest.7584]

9 minutes ago, Bast.7253 said:

Scourge or anything with a lot of ground targeted aoe would probably counter it.

 

This. I feel like I'm missing something, which I may well be. Why isn't stepping off the node, out of Smoke Screen for a moment, clearing any Blind, and dropping any ground targeted AOE on the node to force the thief off, a viable and common-enough counter?  Ranger Barrage, Scourge Shades, lots of Ele skills, any AOE pulls and knockbacks... It's acknowledged that Guardians and Necros in general can probably deal with it.  I imagine most other professions have effective ground-target AOEs available as well.

 

13 minutes ago, Bast.7253 said:

I mean, necro in general. The fact that they thought necro was in a good place and every match has at least 4 necros is a pretty good indication that there's something wrong... 

 

^I thought the same when reading the update notes.

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

1 hour ago, Twilight Tempest.7584 said:

 

This. I feel like I'm missing something, which I may well be. Why isn't stepping off the node, out of Smoke Screen for a moment, clearing any Blind, and dropping any ground targeted AOE on the node to force the thief off, a viable and common-enough counter?  Ranger Barrage, Scourge Shades, lots of Ele skills, any AOE pulls and knockbacks... It's acknowledged that Guardians and Necros in general can probably deal with it.  I imagine most other professions have effective ground-target AOEs available as well.

 

 

^I thought the same when reading the update notes.

Ok so, let me elaborate a bit further.

 

1. Look what Smoke Fields do for finishers: Smoke field - Guild Wars 2 Wiki (GW2W)
2. Notice everything on Thief Pistol main hand and off hand is a projectile finisher: Pistol - Guild Wars 2 Wiki (GW2W)
3. BP Shot is spamming blind pit, Smoke Screen is spamming blind pit, every attack it uses from the smoke field blind pits are projectile finishers that spam more blind. When it whirls with Dagger Storm or stolen skill it is spamming more blind with whirl finisher. Lately I've been seeing them use Impaling Lotus over Bound so that every dodge roll they do is another whirl finisher that spams even more blind.
4. Read these traits: Cloaked in Shadow - Guild Wars 2 Wiki (GW2W) - Shadow Siphoning - Guild Wars 2 Wiki so they are standing in a perpetual smoke field where they can stealth any time they want to with a quick shortbow swap and blast which blinds you from the stealth which steals health from you and heals them. If they aren't stealthing they are firing 100% projectile finishers at you that is dealing the normal damage from the projectiles in addition to constantly blinding you with blinds packed into blinds and every blind is stealing health from you and healing the Thief. And this is only mentioning the blind health steals & heals from the projectiles, not even getting into the perma cycle of blind pits that are pulsing blind every 1s under you that is also stealing your health and healing the Thief

So what's going on here is that if you stand in those blind pits, you take a ton of damage because that trait turns the pulsing blind pits into something like a Necro damage well due to that trait Cloaked In Shadow. Between the pulsing blind pits that deal consistent damage that you can't even mitigate because they are neither condi nor power damage, you take cannot stop that damage, and of course you are perma blinded and can rarely tag the Thief with hits. This allows him to spam Unload on you, which obviously deals a lot of damage, in addition to the additional blinds that the projectiles finishers are creating through the blind fields, which is stealing even more health from you in the form of damage and further healing the Thief.

 

^ Now you should be able to understand what I mean when I say "There are only 2 or maybe 3 specific builds right now that can even stand on a node and hold the cap vs. that without needing to IMMEDIATELY sacrifice the node cap if they want a chance to actually 1v1 and kill the Thief." Other builds do exactly what you've said, and leave the node so they don't die in the pulsing blind pit unload spam because they have to. There is no other way to counter play this. <- When a method of an onslaught is this strong to where it automatically forces most builds in the game to immediately have to flee from the node for survival which allows the Thief to get a free decap and usually an easy full cap in the end, it's too strong.

 

I want to really highlight what I am saying here. I am not saying that you can't beat this Thief build in a 1v1 ultimately in the end. I am saying that very specifically when it comes to the game of conquest and holding small nodes in 1v1s, this Thief build is currently too loaded and greatly overperforming in its ability to get sound & easy decaps and fullcaps right out from under someone during a duel. And this happens because people ARE doing what you've said, they have to. Players must leave the node and not stand in the pulsing BP Shots and Smoke Screens. It's not that you can't fight the Thief and win, it's that you have no chance of holding a node while doing it, and by the time you win some elongated 1v1 against a perma blinding machine, the time invested isn't worth it.

 

@Bast.7253 Yeah the life steal on blind is where a lot of the damage comes from.

Edited May 2, 2021 by Trevor Boyer.6524

[Twilight Tempest.7584]

@Trevor Boyer.6524 Thanks for elaborating.  The initial post seemed to be focused on Smoke Screen as the primary problem, so I responded based on that.  Combined with other frequent sources of Blind along with the siphoning traits, I can see how the build is a bit loaded.  Not sure if and how it should be adjusted though.  Either way, seems every time Thief gets a particularly effective build it gets nuked eventually. 😕

 

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

6 hours ago, Twilight Tempest.7584 said:

@Trevor Boyer.6524 Thanks for elaborating.  The initial post seemed to be focused on Smoke Screen as the primary problem, so I responded based on that.  Combined with other frequent sources of Blind along with the siphoning traits, I can see how the build is a bit loaded.  Not sure if and how it should be adjusted though.  Either way, seems every time Thief gets a particularly effective build it gets nuked eventually. 😕

 

It's just Smoke Screen that puts it over the top.

 

BP Shot and everything else is fine. BP Shot is small enough that you can find some sliver of the node to stand on still. But Smoke Screen covers the entire node. During the 7s of Smoke Screen, you have to bail the node entirely and 7s is long enough for a Thief to decap a full cap node.

 

They need to nerf the duration of Smoke Screen and/or make the radius smaller.

 

After elaborating and thinking about it, this is my best suggestion.

Edited May 2, 2021 by Trevor Boyer.6524

[saerni.2584]

15 minutes ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

It's just Smoke Screen that puts it over the top.

 

BP Shot and everything else is fine. BP Shot is small enough that you can find some sliver of the node to stand on still. But Smoke Screen covers the entire node. During the 7s of Smoke Screen, you have to bail the node entirely and 7s is long enough for a Thief to decap a full cap node.

 

They need to nerf the duration of Smoke Screen and/or make the radius smaller.

 

After elaborating and thinking about it, this is my best suggestion.

The thing with smoke screen is that it can be overcome in a few key ways: 
 

1. Quickness allows attacks to pressure someone inside the field. Especially those that stack up a decent amount of AoE pulses. The more they are evading the less pressure and combo blinds are on you.
2. Any sort of AoE  damage that pulses (most of them) can still force a thief off node if you can stand off node a moment with some projectile denial/block. 
3. Use blocks, or evades, or your own blinds, or aegis, or a partial invulnerable skill (not the full invulnerable skills) to stay on node during the duration. After you exhaust the timer on Smoke Screen the thief will be much more reliant on burning initiative to maintain their blind spam. Save your damage cool downs and use them smartly to force the thief off node (staying out of the BP fields).

 

I think the main problem is that your suggestion to shave duration off Smoke Screen will either make Smoke Screen completely unviable at the extreme end (making the side mixing build unworkable) and won't actually do much to prevent the other combos you have issues with (blasting smoke fields for example relies on a limited number of blasts and cool downs that you/your team are willing/able to burn just for stealth—you don't need duration so much as coordinated team mates—and projectile finishers will likely still force someone off node who felt pressured to leave previously). 
 

The whole "it covers the whole node thing" has some merit. But, Anet doesn't seem to generally care that nodes are all different sizes and some nodes can be covered by certain AoEs and others can't. It just doesn't seem like a complaint Anet is willing to balance around (see DH traps or Scourge or Firebrand or Renegade or...yeah it's a lot). 
 

I'd question why thief needs to take a fall here when it comes to survivability and a potential support role (smoke field combos to allies plus giving team mates a projectile denial to fight in) when it isn't even something most teams care to build around because there are more effective team support options. You would have a better argument if the uptime wasn't based on a (base) 45 second cooldown. You might quibble a bit over the potential 36 second cooldown (or Improvisation or Payback for that matter) but the truth remains it's a big cooldown and you can play around it if you want, either on or off node (getting decapped is fine if you force them to burn defensive cool downs while saving most of your own offensive cool downs for after the shield drops). And the existence of abilities like Wall of Reflection that are a huge counter to projectile spam (of the kind at issue here you listed), with a long duration and lower cooldown (reflect is better than absorption here, although sans the blind) somewhat makes me feel like thief is fitting in rather than standing out with Smoke Screen as it exists now.

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

25 minutes ago, saerni.2584 said:

The thing with smoke screen is that it can be overcome in a few key ways: 
 

1. Quickness allows attacks to pressure someone inside the field. Especially those that stack up a decent amount of AoE pulses. The more they are evading the less pressure and combo blinds are on you.
2. Any sort of AoE  damage that pulses (most of them) can still force a thief off node if you can stand off node a moment with some projectile denial/block. 
3. Use blocks, or evades, or your own blinds, or aegis, or a partial invulnerable skill (not the full invulnerable skills) to stay on node during the duration. After you exhaust the timer on Smoke Screen the thief will be much more reliant on burning initiative to maintain their blind spam. Save your damage cool downs and use them smartly to force the thief off node (staying out of the BP fields).

 

I think the main problem is that your suggestion to shave duration off Smoke Screen will either make Smoke Screen completely unviable at the extreme end (making the side mixing build unworkable) and won't actually do much to prevent the other combos you have issues with (blasting smoke fields for example relies on a limited number of blasts and cool downs that you/your team are willing/able to burn just for stealth—you don't need duration so much as coordinated team mates—and projectile finishers will likely still force someone off node who felt pressured to leave previously). 
 

The whole "it covers the whole node thing" has some merit. But, Anet doesn't seem to generally care that nodes are all different sizes and some nodes can be covered by certain AoEs and others can't. It just doesn't seem like a complaint Anet is willing to balance around (see DH traps or Scourge or Firebrand or Renegade or...yeah it's a lot). 
 

I'd question why thief needs to take a fall here when it comes to survivability and a potential support role (smoke field combos to allies plus giving team mates a projectile denial to fight in) when it isn't even something most teams care to build around because there are more effective team support options. You would have a better argument if the uptime wasn't based on a (base) 45 second cooldown. You might quibble a bit over the potential 36 second cooldown (or Improvisation or Payback for that matter) but the truth remains it's a big cooldown and you can play around it if you want, either on or off node (getting decapped is fine if you force them to burn defensive cool downs while saving most of your own offensive cool downs for after the shield drops). And the existence of abilities like Wall of Reflection that are a huge counter to projectile spam (of the kind at issue here you listed), with a long duration and lower cooldown (reflect is better than absorption here, although sans the blind) somewhat makes me feel like thief is fitting in rather than standing out with Smoke Screen as it exists now.

 

Alright

 

1. Quickness is not enough pressure because it isn't just the blind pit pulsing blinds on you, it's also the endless cycle of projectile finishers that makes more blind stacked upon blind. You can't hit the Thief man. Standing in the blind pits also heals the Thief = bad idea.
2. I've already stated that Necro/Guardian has enough big AoE pulsing damage fields to be able to hit the Thief. These are only two classes.
3. Yes you can leave the node to not stand in the 7s blind pit, but in 7s the node gets decapped. Reread my previous statement and the exact problem I've highlighted about how the problem isn't that the Thief is ultimate high powered combat OP, but rather that it instantly forces a decap out from under someone for free due to this build structure and too big of a radius on Smoke Screen. <- This is a stronger decap method than knockbacks ever were.
4. You said: "Use blocks, or evades, or your own blinds, or aegis, or a partial invulnerable skill" Not everything is a Guardian that can spam Aegis & Invuln & constantly cleanse condis and make Resistance. Of course every class can dodge roll and has a couple other defensive measures on 30 CDs, but it isn't enough. Clearly the Thief will do other things like CC you and counter play what you are doing as well. You can't stand in these blind pits man, it gets you killed. Smoke Screen is a skill that when used, is a free decap out from under most classes in a 1v1 and it's too much.
5. Reducing the radius of Smoke Screen will effect nothing other than a player's ability to find a place on a node to stand so they can contest it against the Thief. They don't need a Smoke Screen large enough to entirely cover a side node, for all of the reasons I've explained here.

[Jumpel.3972]

50 minutes ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

Quickness is not enough pressure because it isn't just the blind pit pulsing blinds on you, it's also the endless cycle of projectile finishers that makes more blind stacked upon blind. You can't hit the Thief man. Standing in the blind pits also heals the Thief = bad idea.

Then you can stay in the smoke and only use defensive skills to prevent the decap ?

[Disney.7826]

U say holo and rene cant win thief? Everything wins thief in 1v1, thats your learn to play problem

[Stand The Wall.6987]

19 hours ago, Leonidrex.5649 said:

necro blinding well is broken as kitten for example

 

😂😂😂😂😂

[Styros.8931]

20 minutes ago, Filip.7463 said:

U say holo and rene cant win thief? Everything wins thief in 1v1, thats your learn to play problem

bud he playing ranger , and he has problems vs thiefs . Cringe , specially after he drop own video where he basicly 1shot supp afk necro 😂

 

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

1 hour ago, Jumpel.3972 said:

Then you can stay in the smoke and only use defensive skills to prevent the decap ?

 

Yeah if you want to burn every defensive CD you have so that you're completely vulnerable afterwards, sure.

Edited May 2, 2021 by Trevor Boyer.6524

[Jumpel.3972]

18 minutes ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

Yeah if you want to burn every defensive CD you have so that you're completely vulnerable afterwards, sure.

Well the thief is vulnerable too afterwards so it's a reasonable trade off

[shadowpass.4236]

 

This blind spam build has been around for a while.  Probably won't get nerfed until more people abuse it in ranked.

 

Here's a few videos showing the build:

1. Poor warrior, he hit me 2 times in a fight that lasted 25 seconds cause I just kept blinding him.

2. Full fight

3. Watch how I miss SEVEN attacks in a row with quickness at this timestamp because of how frequently I get blinded.  6 of which were autoattacks I was spamming which is the fastest way I can deal damage outside of rapid fire + barrage.  Smokescreen OP

 

Edited May 2, 2021 by shadowpass.4236

[Crab Fear.1624]

Doesnt work against eles, necros, prot holos, mirages, condi heralds.

 

also any class that can use resist or lay target aoe.

 

works very well against wars, and rangers that want to go toes instead of waiting out smoke.

 

it is a non-issue.

[Styros.8931]

15 hours ago, shadowpass.4236 said:

 

This blind spam build has been around for a while.  Probably won't get nerfed until more people abuse it in ranked.

 

Here's a few videos showing the build:

1. Poor warrior, he hit me 2 times in a fight that lasted 25 seconds cause I just kept blinding him.

2. Full fight

3. Watch how I miss SEVEN attacks in a row with quickness at this timestamp because of how frequently I get blinded.  6 of which were autoattacks I was spamming which is the fastest way I can deal damage outside of rapid fire + barrage.  Smokescreen OP

 

1st video . Playing thief with pistol that spam black powder, oh wow never happen before , I said million times that devs need nerf d/p p/d p/p build, its not about smoke screen 

2nd video . ranger like iron clown stay WHOLE TIME in smoke screen as ranger vs condi thief who ranged too , oh wow, you are skilled bud, nerf thiefs . 

Someday kids gonna learn difference between smoke screen and blind powder but not today, today kids think 50 sec cd skill is op , but not skill from pistols that has 0sec cd 

Edited May 3, 2021 by Styros.8931

[TrollingDemigod.3041]

It's quite surprising, because Veteran Scouts in WvW camp use this tactic since forever and it's actually pain in kitten to deal with them if you don't have lose to pull them out of these Smoke fields. Took long enough teefs to discover this cheese I guess...
Blind really need to be looked at and not just a teef, there should be some kind of "downtime" like "You can be affected by blind once every 5s by any source for max 3s duration" and that should apply to pretty much every cc and condi in the game.

[Styros.8931]

5 minutes ago, TrollingDemigod.3041 said:

It's quite surprising, because Veteran Scouts in WvW camp use this tactic since forever and it's actually pain in kitten to deal with them if you don't have lose to pull them out of these Smoke fields. Took long enough teefs to discover this cheese I guess...
Blind really need to be looked at and not just a teef, there should be some kind of "downtime" like "You can be affected by blind once every 5s by any source for max 3s duration" and that should apply to pretty much every cc and condi in the game.

sure, after we remove rapid fire on ranger, burn and aegis on guard , confusion on mesmer , 2nd hp on necro and etc etc 

Edited May 3, 2021 by Styros.8931

[TrollingDemigod.3041]

5 minutes ago, Styros.8931 said:

sure, after we remove rapid fire on ranger, burn and aegis on guard , confusion on mesmer , 2nd hp on necro and etc etc 

See? What you've pointed is just a tiny droplet of water in an ocean of problems created by e-speces.
Rapid Fire on it's own is more or less "ok", the problem here is the amount of % modifiers and how much it can be buffed via traits/utility skills and many more. 
In case of burn, I believe ALL condies should be at most "subdps" role, which would help you a bit, but should never become major source of damage in any form ever, since we have quite a circus in WvW because of that.
Aegis, IMO the boon itself isn't the problem, but the reapplication rate (waves at Firebrand, ups another broken e-spec).
Confusion, same as burn and all other condies, should become subdps.
I'm more than fine with removing second hp from Necros, it could become something like Yolosmith furnance mode. Though defenses for necro are quite "luckluster" to say it as nicely as possible.
Teef on the other hand need to be shaved in mobility, evasion, stealth and condi spam(blind, weakness, etc), also something need to be done with cc on weapon skills. I still wonder why teef didn't get an overhauled at all, since their Initiative will never allow for good balance for this class in the slightest.
There's a lot more thing that need to be fixed or reworked, sadly.
The game overall is in very poor state and the reason for it isn't feb2020, but the poorly designed specces.

[Yasai.3549]

I wonder if they removed the Blind portion of D/P 3, they can reduce the Ini cost. 
The way it's going, it will be an eventuality when they do up the Ini cost of skills AGAIN. 

Also Black Powder in general, while a nice little Smoke Field, does it have to shoot a Blind Projectile? Honestly, no.
Could remove that and reduce the Ini cost as well. 

Would make fighting Thief 1v1 less of a Blind fest, but also allow Thief more freedom with their Ini spending. 

[Styros.8931]

2 hours ago, TrollingDemigod.3041 said:

Rapid Fire on it's own is more or less "ok"

funny joke bud, kill in 1 button is "ok" when you are ranger. Any thief that actually assassin class can't kill with 1 button in 1 sec, but for ranger its ok , because YOU playing ranger 😉

Edited May 3, 2021 by Styros.8931

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

I'd like to mention none of this would be an issue if thieves had any number of builds that let them do anything pvp requires. As it stands right now all of their implementations require them to drop in on an already existing fight like a vulture or actively abandon point objectives.

 

I don't have any sentiments other than that. Be mad at the blind spam, but instead of asking for specifically it to be nerfed, give thieves something skillful -and effective- to play, or they'll be back next week with something even more annoying and less effective. 

 

Or they won't and someone else will have to decap. 

Edited May 3, 2021 by Azure The Heartless.3261

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

1 hour ago, Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

I'd like to mention none of this would be an issue if thieves had any number of builds that let them do anything pvp requires. As it stands right now all of their implementations require them to drop in on an already existing fight like a vulture or actively abandon point objectives.

 

I don't have any sentiments other than that. Be mad at the blind spam, but instead of asking for specifically it to be nerfed, give thieves something skillful -and effective- to play, or they'll be back next week with something even more annoying and less effective. 

 

Or they won't and someone else will have to decap. 

 

It's just Smoke Screen radius that needs to be nerfed, that and maybe 7s duration needs to go to 5s. That skill is too loaded on conquest side nodes.