Thief - PvE

I've found thieves to be very fun to play as. They move in and out of combat quickly and effectively, and they have plenty of different abilities to choose from. Here's the gist of PvE thief:

Weapon Skills:

Versus one opponent, I found the Sword x Dagger combo to be most effective. Main hand sword does the most damage for a thief, and it has a shadowstep ability for getting in and out fast. I went with dagger dual wield because 1. I could never get the Pistol Whip ability to work very good unless I was right next to the enemy, and 2. Cloak and Dagger's stealth was more useful than Head shot's daze.

Versus multiple opponents, the Shortbow wins outright. It's the thief's only AoE attacks, and it can carry venom utilities to multiple enemies. Disabling shot was useful for getting away from enemies, but I never used Infiltrator's arrow because I have a bow, why do I need to run up to the enemy when I can switch to sword and do that?


Healing I can never decide which I want to use. Hide in Shadows never seems to heal enough, and the stealth doesn't last long, so I don't use that often. Withdraw and Signet of Malice are both great for Shortbow, Withdraw getting you away from the enemy while healing, and Signet healing you while you hit multiple enemies.

I suppose Prayer to Dwayna would be good for Sword then? I wanted to try out more abilities, so I didn't use 6 points on that.

Thief has 5 different kinds of Utilities. Venom, traps, signets, trick, and deception.

Venom applies different debuffs to your next few attacks. I found Skale Venom, which weakens the enemy, to be most effective with the Shortbow. They all have their uses though.

Traps are generally more useful in WvW than in PvE. Traps can be used in certain events, but it's better to save your slots for something else.

Signets are a passive bonus that can be activated to give a one-time bonus. Nothing out of the ordinary here.

Deception is AoE buffs for allies and debuffs for enemies. More useful in WvW than PvE. Also, Shadowstep, but I'll get to that in the WvW topic.

Tricks are great for PvE. Haste doubles your attacks and Roll gets you away from enemies fast. Didn't try the other two.

Great post about the thief. The thief is basically the assassin of GW2. It was my favorite character in the old game and was very tough to use. I'd like to know what everyone's experience was like with their main characters. (Engineers, Warriors, Mesmers, etc...)

My hope is that everyone will post a topic similar to this.

I would really like to know who all used the Mesmer... Not a very Popular Character that I could tell. It is honestly one of the best characters in PvP. My opinion of playing against one always had me screaming, "I HATE Mesmers!" --- Cast Interrupted --- Every attempt I made would make me damage myself. Grrr!

Oh, and apparently Steal is awesome for shadowstep, but I never used it because the f1 key is too far away :p.

I played a Ranger last beta, but I've been messing with ranged thief builds that I'll probably try out this time around. I'm think a Shortbow/Dual Pistol thief. Do you guys think this would be viable? My trait build revolves around CC and sustainability (frequent stealthing and healing).

Here's the build if you guys wanna check it out and give me some feedback >> http://www.gw2tools.com/skills#t;appfa;aaafgWWdUcaaaaa;ZaYY;ZYidZ

Looks good to me, all I can say is that you'll want shortbow for groups of enemies and handguns for duels.

The reason that I used a sword instead of gun is because sword dealt more damage in general.

Thanks, I'll probably mix it up depending on the situation