12 replies to this topic

[Mssg91]

Is it possible to be defensive thief? Elementalist can be great at defending point but what about thief? I am little bit tired of being 2 shoted when I jump into wrong place...

[Phigment]

Mssg91, on 13 January 2013 - 03:46 PM, said:

Is it possible to be defensive thief? Elementalist can be great at defending point but what about thief? I am little bit tired of being 2 shoted when I jump into wrong place...

You can go into a more defensive playstyle (shadow arts), but your never going to be great at defending a node since stealth is part of your defense. I've been a 30 S/A spec since I started playing a thief at release for pvp, I often try other specs, but I always come back because of the slightly longer extending power of S/A, and gear>spec

[TGIFrisbie]

Your survival for Thief isn't based around tanky stats or traits.  It is based around mobility, stealths, dodges, etc.  If you try to build a survival thief you will end up with a crappy tank and a crappy dps.  Just avoid it.

[Cobra Kai]

TGIFrisbie, on 21 January 2013 - 06:35 PM, said:

Your survival for Thief isn't based around tanky stats or traits.  It is based around mobility, stealths, dodges, etc.  If you try to build a survival thief you will end up with a crappy tank and a crappy dps.  Just avoid it.

...really? Do you have a personal vendetta against other play-styles or something?

https://www.youtube....i4aYy2g&index=9

Edited by Cobra Kai, 21 January 2013 - 08:13 PM.

[stabbystabstab]

Cobra Kai, on 21 January 2013 - 08:12 PM, said:

...really? Do you have a personal vendetta against other play-styles or something?

https://www.youtube....i4aYy2g&index=9

Yeah...2.3k toughness is not "Tanky stats". And since OP mentioned ele bunkers, I assume he's asking about spvp, not WvW. That build wouldn't be fit for a bunker or a roamer, you'll be in the 3man with no quick res, no venom share, time warp or hard CCs.

Looks fun in WvW though, may give that a try sometimes.

[lmaonade]

Thieves cannot defend a point as well as other classes can, the 2 main defensive abilities it has are stealth and evasion, evasion cannot be kept up 100% and is only used well in skirmishing over a medium large area, and stealth cannot hold points

[Jan Roman]

lmaonade, on 29 January 2013 - 11:02 PM, said:

Thieves cannot defend a point as well as other classes can, the 2 main defensive abilities it has are stealth and evasion, evasion cannot be kept up 100% and is only used well in skirmishing over a medium large area, and stealth cannot hold points

As a condition thief, I can hold a point against 2 players for least for 2 minutes. Of course that glass canon backstab builds can't, but some of the builds can and I believe do it very well.

Edited by Jan Roman, 29 January 2013 - 11:12 PM.

[Phigment]

Jan Roman, on 29 January 2013 - 11:11 PM, said:

As a condition thief, I can hold a point against 2 players for least for 2 minutes. Of course that glass canon backstab builds can't, but some of the builds can and I believe do it very well.

I call BS as your not holding the point.....sure you may annoy the other players, even kill the non smart ones with caltrops drop, I can do the same as a direct dmg build. But when you go into stealth you're loosing the point, not holding it

Edited by Phigment, 30 January 2013 - 03:12 AM.

[Jan Roman]

Phigment, on 30 January 2013 - 01:36 AM, said:

I call BS as your not holding the point.....sure you may annoy the other players, even kill the non smart ones with caltrops drop, I can do the same as a direct dmg build. But when you go into stealth you're loosing the point, not holding it

If neccessary, I don't have to stay in stealth. I just pop it for regeneration and initiative gain and continue fighting. Sure, I can't hold it forever against two good players. However, if one of the two enemies is a bad player, he gets killed quite quickly and it gets easier. There fore it is possible to hold the point, but I have been learning how to do it properly for a long time and there is still much to improve.

[lmaonade]

Jan Roman, on 30 January 2013 - 09:55 AM, said:

If neccessary, I don't have to stay in stealth. I just pop it for regeneration and initiative gain and continue fighting. Sure, I can't hold it forever against two good players. However, if one of the two enemies is a bad player, he gets killed quite quickly and it gets easier. There fore it is possible to hold the point, but I have been learning how to do it properly for a long time and there is still much to improve.

but every single time you stealth you lose a portion of the point, so unless the enemies are so horrible that you never need to stealth then you'll eventually lose the point altogether, not to say that thieves can't do it for at least a while, but they aren't exactly the best at it

[Jan Roman]

You are right. The time you can hold the point really depends only on how you trait and on the gear you have. While condition thief can long it quite well, backstab thief will have a lot of trouble because he is very squishy and does not have enough survability to do such a task (unless it is a 1vs1 situation, in that case burst build is perfect).

[Phigment]

Jan Roman, on 31 January 2013 - 10:35 AM, said:

You are right. The time you can hold the point really depends only on how you trait and on the gear you have. While condition thief can long it quite well, backstab thief will have a lot of trouble because he is very squishy and does not have enough survability to do such a task (unless it is a 1vs1 situation, in that case burst build is perfect).

You should change that from BS to glass cannon build. Plenty of choices to make a BS build that has 20k health, the same "toughness" as condition, the same healing/condition removal. The game is more gear>spec based

Edited by Phigment, 31 January 2013 - 08:50 PM.

[NotKMoose]

Sword/dagger is your best bet with a point denial thief.. I wouldn't say you can be an effective bunker but with a S/D thief but you can keep moving around, stunning and evading over points. With the right build you can keep two people occupied pretty easily..