GW2 Thief Discussion

[grandpab]

Any thoughts on Infiltrator's Signet vs Shadowstep ? It seems the latter is pretty much redundant as Infiltrator's Signet has an Init regen buff AND Shadowsteps on activation. The cooldown of IS is also shorter than that of SS.

Another thing that I'm still confused about is Hide in Shadows. Is it perma-stealth ? We know it can't be used in combat (at least it wasn't the last time it was tested) but there is no feedback on the duration of the stealth. Would be interesting if it was perma.

Finally, is there any video showing Thieves Guild ? I'd like to know if the summoned thieves look like you, that would be a giant middle finger to Mesmers.

Shadowstep takes you to the target location, and Infiltrators Signet shadowsteps to your target. Shadowstep will just be used as an extra closer/escape ability.

Everything I've heard is that there is no perma-stealth in this game, so I don't see that happening. Also, I don't see why you couldn't use it in combat, it was probably just bugged. That pretty much makes the skill useless since health regen is insane when you're not in combat, and it's one of 3 of our self healing abilities.

[DrunkenBeard]

Shadowstep takes you to the target location, and Infiltrators Signet shadowsteps to your target. Shadowstep will just be used as an extra closer/escape ability.

Well you've only got 3 abilities aside from your Elite and Healing ones so I very much doubt anyone would take two on-demand SSs, when one is obviously better than the other and we already have SS/Leap baked in a lot of our weapon abilities. I really don't see how anyone would take it instead of IS, unless I'm missing something.

[DrakeWurrum]

One is not automatically better than the other. The basic Shadowstep can be used to escape, or simply as increased mobility traveling from point A to point B, not just as a gapcloser, simply because you shadowstep to a location instead of a target. O_o

It's CD seems a little ridiculously long to me, but oh well. Maybe traits can do something about that.

[DrunkenBeard]

One is not automatically better than the other. The basic Shadowstep can be used to escape, or simply as increased mobility traveling from point A to point B, not just as a gapcloser, simply because you shadowstep to a location instead of a target. O_o

It's CD seems a little ridiculously long to me, but oh well. Maybe traits can do something about that.

Oh you mean you can use Shadowstep to just teleport to a location without requiring a target ? That would be interesting. The wording of the ability is "Shadowstep to the target location" so I guess you're right. I just assumed it was a "regular" Shadowstep like the one in World of Warcraft.

That being said, it could be problematic in WvW. Could Shadowstep and more importantly Infiltrator's Arrow be used to jump over walls seeing as they don't require to target an enemy ?

[DrakeWurrum]

That being said, it could be problematic in WvW. Could Shadowstep and more importantly Infiltrator's Arrow be used to jump over walls seeing as they don't require to target an enemy ?

Unlike Blizzard, ANet actually encourages clever use of mechanics like this. Assuming, of course, you're talking about "jumping over walls" as in jumping over the walls of a fortress. One of the neat tricks of being a Mesmer that they used to highlight some of what a Mesmer does is combining the portal creation thing with stealth. A Mesmer could lay an entrance outside a fortress, stealth through the enemies, drop an exist inside on the other side of a wall. Boom, a way in for the whole army.

If you're thinking people can use it to jump over imaginary barriers that they put in the game to keep you from going to certain places, no, that's not going to be possible.

[DrunkenBeard]

Unlike Blizzard, ANet actually encourages clever use of mechanics like this. Assuming, of course, you're talking about "jumping over walls" as in jumping over the walls of a fortress. One of the neat tricks of being a Mesmer that they used to highlight some of what a Mesmer does is combining the portal creation thing with stealth. A Mesmer could lay an entrance outside a fortress, stealth through the enemies, drop an exist inside on the other side of a wall. Boom, a way in for the whole army.

If you're thinking people can use it to jump over imaginary barriers that they put in the game to keep you from going to certain places, no, that's not going to be possible.

What I meant was scenarios where a team is attacking a keep while another team is defending it and Thieves from the attacking team being able to jump over the keep's walls.

[DrakeWurrum]

What I meant was scenarios where a team is attacking a keep while another team is defending it and Thieves from the attacking team being able to jump over the keep's walls.

Well yeah, like I said, ANet encourages that kind of gameplay. Clever use of game mechanics is something players should be rewarded for, imo, and it's one of my big beefs with how Blizzard handles encounters.
But seeing how stealth is always short duration, and there's likely to be multiple people there for defense... Have fun with that!

[braxx]

simple question: does attacking breaks stealth preemptively or is it just impossible do attack or make any action while stealthed?

[Glytch]

simple question: does attacking breaks stealth preemptively or is it just impossible do attack or make any action while stealthed?

when you use a skill (that is, attack) you pop out

the exception is steal, probably a few utility skills too

---------- Post added 2012-02-25 at 01:51 PM ----------

What I meant was scenarios where a team is attacking a keep while another team is defending it and Thieves from the attacking team being able to jump over the keep's walls.

you still need line of sight, even if the reintroduce the "shadowstep to a random location" skills they had in gw1 you wont be able to bug out height this time since the Z axis will be more well enforced

[Hellgaunt]

Oh you mean you can use Shadowstep to just teleport to a location without requiring a target ? That would be interesting. The wording of the ability is "Shadowstep to the target location" so I guess you're right. I just assumed it was a "regular" Shadowstep like the one in World of Warcraft.

That being said, it could be problematic in WvW. Could Shadowstep and more importantly Infiltrator's Arrow be used to jump over walls seeing as they don't require to target an enemy ?

Only if there's a path you could walk to get there. You can't 'teleport' to places you can't path to.

[Glytch]

Only if there's a path you could walk to get there. You can't 'teleport' to places you can't path to.

that's infiltrator's arrow, calling it shadowstep is ambiguous since there is a move called "shadowstep"

[Larynx]

Oh you mean you can use Shadowstep to just teleport to a location without requiring a target ? That would be interesting. The wording of the ability is "Shadowstep to the target location" so I guess you're right. I just assumed it was a "regular" Shadowstep like the one in World of Warcraft.

That being said, it could be problematic in WvW. Could Shadowstep and more importantly Infiltrator's Arrow be used to jump over walls seeing as they don't require to target an enemy ?

Most likely, (and eles have a similar ability to Shadowstep)

Though one thief will not be able to do much

---------- Post added 2012-02-25 at 04:16 PM ----------

Only if there's a path you could walk to get there. You can't 'teleport' to places you can't path to.

Negative.

At least for the Elemantalist "blink" ability, you don't need pathing. It may be different for Shadowstep though.

[DrakeWurrum]

I hope they allow that kind of clever mechanics. If a large enough people planned to use their "blink" like ability at the same time to blink over the wall, I think they deserve to at least have a shot at winning for that kind of organization and planning. Things like that make the game fun, and force defenders to keep on their toes.

I'm hoping you can't blink THROUGH a wall like that, but OVER a wall (example: the IoC Battleground forts? I'd love blinking over those, or through the gates).

[braxx]

i saw an elementalist pvp vid in which he used the teleport (the one targeted on the ground) many times on the footbridge on the pvp map (at the cathedral). The interesting thing is that he used it while under it but got teleported on top every time so there is no need for pathing if the thief one is the same.

[Autumn xD]

From the recent Reddit AMA:

We don't have the ability to climb walls. We've talked about possibly allowing thief the ability to steal something that could let them through the teleporter gates, but we haven't decided if we actually want to add that yet. It is obviously something that we'd have to be very careful about so we don't want to just add it and have it break the game.

http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comment...kivx?context=3

You have to scroll down a bit as his response is to the last 3 questions in that list, but he is responding to being able to literally scale walls (I assume) and not being able to 'step up. However, the part where he says "We've talked about possibly allowing thief the ability to steal something that could let them through the teleporter gates ..." leads me to believe that you won't be able to 'step up walls, or else what would be the point of him mentioning that steal possibility?

[DrakeWurrum]

I'll frankly be disappointed if I can't just shadowstep through. It's not like it a Thief can take on an entire defending team on his own. Or even a group of 4-5 Thieves...

[braxx]

I'll frankly be disappointed if I can't just shadowstep through. It's not like it a Thief can take on an entire defending team on his own. Or even a group of 4-5 Thieves...

shadowstepping through would be overpowered and would also feel weird since you are just kind of moving very fast and not becoming intangible

[Larynx]

I'll frankly be disappointed if I can't just shadowstep through. It's not like it a Thief can take on an entire defending team on his own. Or even a group of 4-5 Thieves...

As you say that I picture Ezio, and shake my head.

[DrakeWurrum]

As you say that I picture Ezio, and shake my head.

Ezio could not handle a whole group of Ezios. He could handle a group of minimum-wage guards/soldiers in fancy armor, sure, but a whole group of equally-skilled assassins at his level?

No.

[Larynx]

Ezio could not handle a whole group of Ezios.

Unless he was super saiyan Ezio.