5punk

I'm at a stage where I've got a decent enough grasp of the basics of playing a thief, so I'm looking up build advice. I'll put down what I find here, but I think Roman is the only other person with a thief main so it might just be the two of us for now (or just me). Post your thoughts on your class here anyway and share the wealth.

For me, as mentioned elsewhere, I unsurprisingly found that my solo PvE build wasn't much cop in a dungeon. For solo PvE I use dagger/dagger for its high mobility and DPS, and I think that's fairly universally agreed that it's the best option for this kind of play. I carry the shortbow as my alt weapon for group events so I can AoE spam. I don't find it hugely effective, but the AoE poison effect is a field combo, so it's a nice support trick for the group. In dungeons I found sword/pistol to be most effective because it gives you a melee stun, a ranged stun, and an AoE blind, so it's great for locking down a target. You also get a shadow walking skill so you can effectively teleport into combat and then use shadow return to bail out fast if you get aggro or the gribblie drops a pbaoe. I know Roman was preferring the shortbow when we ran AC, so he might have better tactics with that.

I'm looking to go into more detail on the signets (aren't they baby swans?) and specific tactics later, but my biggest struggle at the moment is a sustainable build for when I have a long solo fight. Specifically the Destroyer Queen at the moment. Thieves are notoriously squishy, and fighting a +3 level elite (purple portrait surround, whatever that is) is near impossible due to attrition with what I have at the moment. It's holding up my storyline.

I generally favour Dagger/Dagger and Shortbow.

Dagger/dagger I prefer for PvE. It's quick, burst damage and is generally good for despatching single enemies quickly and effeciently. However, if I get the jump on a target I will always lead with the Shortbow. Poison first for Damage over time and adding the Weakness condition, and then a bomb thing (forget the name) to make them bleed. Note: always airburst your shortbow's bomb blast skill - it does more damage, hits more targets, and causes more bleed conditions. Try and detonate it as close to the ground as possible to ensure it doesn't spread too far and end up hitting nothing. Might also be an idea to throw in a crippling shot at this point - jumps you backwards and slows them down.

By now they're usually up close so I switch to the daggers. Death Blossom is usually a good dagger opener - it causes the target to bleed and also evades their attacks (look for the glowy sand hands). Heartseeker then tends to be my main damage dealer, but remember it does more damage when your target is below 50% health, and more so when below 25% - I try and time it so I've got enough initiative to attack at the right time.

I've gone down the Critical path to give my attacks a higher chance of critting - this builds in to other skills such as 40% chance to inflict vulnerability when getting a crit.

As it happens I'm currently using Sword/Pistol, purely to get some more kills with them (and because I picked up a yellow sword). As you say it's good for stunning and maneuvering, but I find it lacks a little when it comes to damage and quick kills.

Also I'm just about remembering to use the Steal mechanism, but I've not really managed to work it into an attack cycle yet (though the sensible one for daggers is to just jump straight in and get close quickly). It's a great little feature as it poisons the target (though that might be trait dependent) and gives you a free to use skill that doesn't need initiative.

Baby swans I try to mix up a bit. For the healing one I use Hide in Shadows as it heals you and makes you disappear, thus making enemies lose interest. I also go for the Precision one to get my crits up a bit more, and either the one for extra Power or extra Initiative. Other good ones to use are Shadow Refuge (area of effect stealth cone that makes allies invisible, protects from harm and increases regeneration as long as you don't attack - great for emergency revives or evasions) and Radiation Field (area of effect attack, does damage and other stuff that I can't remember.

One other plus for the Shortbow is Infiltrator's Arrow - basically lets you teleport short distances and is great for getting around (especially in WvW where everyone seems to be ultra fast).

Oh, I found something interesting; stealing doesn't break stealth. I've never had much use for stealth before but that could be handy.

I can't comment about the thief as I havn't played it, but I have managed to put 43 levels into my ranger and I can safely say one thing - bows are the way forward.

I use two bows, the long and the short, with the short being my general use weapon for its speed and poisoning, and its cripple, and its stun. Oh and its daze and its "fire me back 5 paces because I am too close and getting hit" skill. Used in conjunction with quickening zephyr you can chuck out a fuck ton of damage in a very short space of time whilst still controlling the fight.
The long bow comes in useful in dungeons and group events when I need to keep my distance, again quickening zephyr lets you chuck out a ton of damage (it also speeds up skill activation so rapid fire and barrage complete quickly without dropping any damage) point blank shot lets you get rid of any pesky hangers on and the third skill (debilitating shot?) that lowers the targets defences is always nice to have up.
Generally for dungeons and most group events I end up switching weapons around to make the most of their skills - cripple with shortbow then point blank shot the target to a safer distance for example - but I also switch out my pets too. I am using a Black Moa (called Eric) who has a stun ability, or a Black Widow (called Hera) who has an immobilise effect - generally Eric does my general combat work and Hera does my dungeon/group event work when it is too dangerous to get in close.
Currently sat on the other half of my bar is; heal as one - heals both me and pet, sharpening stone - for added affliction with longbow, quickening zephyr, a charr shout that grants boons (can't remember name) and my elite is Warband Reinforcements - which calls in two Blood Legion soldiers to help out.
It is not unstoppable but it does have enough control and damge that you can extract yourself from most situations.

My Ranger's quite fun, haven't done any dungeoning, but for the group events against big bosses I like to circle-strafe with the shortbow (never thought I'd use that skill in an MMONG) while darting in and dropping the AoE Healing Well where the close-rangers are getting a pasting. Having the 'pet does resurrection' skill is quite handy too - it's slow but works where no-one else wants to be standing. When stuff gets a bit too close, I can switch to sword+someting which has a nice dodge-type move which gets you behind them.

I'm mostly roleplaying Thor with it though, so haven't really explored anything which doesn't fit with him, but it's working out as quite a good match so far.

I'm only level 12 or so as my Ranger, but I quite liked having a greatsword as my secondary for the aoe when I over-aggro.

I've been reading a few threads on the more theorycrafting sites and, for Thief at least, there seems to be very healthy discussion around which builds are best. Which says to me that it's probably all fairly well balanced. That's great, as cookie-cutter builds are another nail in the coffin of individuality, and in an MMO individuality is important.

Dog Pants wrote:That's great, as cookie-cutter builds are another nail in the coffin of individuality, and in an MMO individuality is important.

I very much agree. In too many of these games I've just picked skills that sounded cool, only to find out later that I'd fatally gimped myself - I enjoyed WoW far less when I started following recommendations at every decision and stopped playing rather than respec in most everything else. With me picking only stuff I think Thor would, the possibility of me nerfing him seems even greater, but this doesn't seem to have been the case. Unless Thor is just naturally awesome.

I have rather fallen prey to the "no sub, no compulsion to play every night" I got with the first game though and haven't played at all for over a week. Been playing Tekkit, Towns and...Guild Wars 1 !