(As posted at Guildwars2.com Forum)
Devata.6589:
With strong I mainly mean that the combination of very fast and invisible makes them very hard to kill, besides that they can do a lot of damage however there are things you can do against that.
You are putting two things into one here.
As a thief, we are to pick either “a lot of damage” or “the combination of very fast and invisible makes them very hard to kill.” Believe me, if you read this forum thoroughly, you’ll find that we’ve been trying to achieve both, but it’s just not possible.
We always have to make a trade off.
But in addition there is also a bug that makes them even harder to kill for a lot of professions / builds.
The problem is that invisibility also makes thief’s invulnerable for multiple attacks.
An example is all ranges attacks that bow’s have, like Point Blank Shot and Rapid Fire. The AoE work but the normal range attack wont work.
Point Blank Shot may not work all the time but Rapid Fire hits everytime if you started the attack before the thief goes on stealth.
You probably thinking that we’re not taking damage because we can heal while in stealth. Hide in Shadows is a Thief heal skill that removes damaging conditions and grants health regen. Shadow Refuge also heals per tick. A trait called Shadow’s Rejuvenation also heals us in stealth.
Therefore, it seems that this is just a perception issue and not a legitimate bug.
The problems / bug seems to be in the fact that there is no target and the system/game can’t handle this.
This is not a bug but a game mechanic and the system/game can handle this.
The whole idea behind invisibility is that it is harder to damage them or do something against there attacks because they are invisible, but this problem now even makes them invulnerable (for some attacks) even if you use the correct skill on the correct moment or you do shoot correct at the invisible thief.
You are misusing the word “invulnerable” in describing something that is untargettable.
They will just notice that they almost never get interrupted when they finish somebody in stealth)
Another perception issue. There are many factors that can prevent interruption especially in a group fight. Blind, Aegis, Stability, etc. are some that comes to mind.
I did find out this bug because when a thief is finishing somebody you pretty much know where he is however the Point Blank Shot never ever works and Thunderclap also never works when a thief tried to finish me.
Again, blind, aegis, stability, etc.
Personally I also think that the combination speed and invisibility makes them to good at getting away. It makes it to easy for a thief to try and back-stab and if they see it does not work (they lose the fight) they can use a combination of speed and invisibility to get out of the fight. Something that does not really seems fair as you should have the possibility to attack the person that attacks you. However adding the partially invulnerability to it really makes it to much. (for some builds / professions)
You do have the 4s window to kill a thief who back-stabbed you. In case that the stealth wears off naturally, we can go back in stealth again since stealth that ends normally do no penalize us with the Revealed debuff.
Some professions / builds will not have this problems others do.
Every profession has to deal with something when fighting certain professions.
Your concern seems to be driven by lack of understanding and misinformation about the Thief profession. All of your issues are driven from your own perspective and it is one-sided since you never bother to investigate the underlying cause of what you think to be is the problem.
It it nice to hear your side of the issue, but try not to jump into conclusions only having your perception as your sole basis to your concerns. You also need to take into account the various “fixes” that was already implemented to the Thief profession that most of them are simply inadequate in fixing whetever issue Anet see needs fixing. In other words, we don’t need another unsubstantiated, unjustified “fixes.”
Thank you for sharing your concern and I’m sure that Anet have read this or already have this issue in their internal discussion and debates. But let’s not try to condemn a profession simply based on your inconclusive evidence.
