Critique my dagger/dagger-pistol/pistol thief? :3

[Raye]

Hiii

I just started getting into my thief again; I'm close to level 70 now so decided to actually start thinking about my final build. This is what I'm leaning towards: http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#...am0G0GxcamsVcq

I'm not actually sure how good it is at all, I find thieves a bit counter-intuitive. I know the pistol/pistol weapon set is not all that great, but I don't really like how the shortbow plays... I wanted a ranged option and using dagger/dagger - pistol/dagger seemed silly...

I'm aiming for getting as much initiative as possible, and buffing up the steal skill. Since both the pistol and the daggers apply lots of bleeds, I also wanted high condition damage. I also wanted to be very slippery and mobile, so I wanted some speed buffs here and there.

Anywho... I posted only weapons, utility skills and traits, but I'm planning to go for full rampager's set. I have no clue about what rune set to pick. Sigils, I'm thinking stuff related to bleeding and power. Currently on my list are: a superior sigil of bloodlust and superior sigil of agony, but I'm still pondering. I might go Geomancy, Earth, Agony and Bloodlust.

Thoughts? All feedback is welcome :3

[shawn]

I'd switch out the caltrops on dodge for vigor on steal. More dodges are always good.

Also I think it's probably better to increase the damage you deal rather than your initiative, but I'll have to look at it more closely when I'm actually at a computer. In the meantime I guess I'll just bump this.

tapatalk hd on nexus 7

[Fluffball]

I think you're going to be really lacking in damage. One simple thing you can do is take the trait where you get might when you dodge instead of the trait that gives you swiftness on kills. You already get swiftness when you dodge, and you can dodge what feels like whenever you want to.

Personally I'd find at least 10 to put in to DA. Whether you want a power or conditioned based build, both will benefit from that line.

Edit: I also disagree with shawn on the caltrops. If you want a conditioned based build, those things are outstanding. And really, 15 in acrobatics means you can dodge like ALL the time. It's amazing. Anymore dodging and you're not every going to be attacking anything, just rolling about like a 3 year old.

[shawn]

It's not just the vigor though, it also rips two boons and gives those two plus the vigor to all nearby allies. The caltrops on the other hand are a very small radius and only last four seconds, so if you're going to go that route I'd just bring the actual Caltrops skill itself rather than the dodge trait.

I guess it would look something like this:
http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#...vm0x0GGcsqMsVk

Picking the crit trait mostly because 20% more damage below 50% is better than anything I see in tier one of Deadly Arts, and will help out with Unload spam. However if you don't go on the pistol set much and just want to boost conditions from Caltrops and Death Blossom more than crits, put 10 in Deadly Arts for 10% longer conditions and get the poison duration trait.

[Fluffball]

Four seconds is a really long time when most fights in PvE last about 15 seconds and you can dodge 3 times in a row.

I've never used the caltrops myself, but facing them in PvP I know it's an outstanding way to put bleeding on everything in the general.... everything. They're also AoE, which thieves are lacking in, especially not using a shortbow.

[shawn]

Well when I think pve I think dungeon mobs, not killing random centaurs in Gendarran.

[Fluffball]

Then they would be even more useful, since they apply cripple as well as stacking the bleeds.

[Xunlai Agent]

You need to have a really good reason not to put 30 points in Critical Hits for pretty much any thief build that's viable, I do not see such a reason. I would re-trait and I would reconsider taking P/P as a ranged option.

[Fluffball]

She wants to do a condition based build, so I don't see the crits as being that important. With some added might, condition duration and keeping caltrops it could work. Not my cup of tea for a thief, but I think it should work.

[Xunlai Agent]

She wants to do a condition based build, so I don't see the crits as being that important. With some added might, condition duration and keeping caltrops it could work. Not my cup of tea for a thief, but I think it should work.

This is such a typical GWO response, dude anything can work but the trade-off is simply not worth it whether you plan to run condition damage or not - sorry. You simply don't run 30 Trickery over 30 Critical Strikes no matter what you are trying to do. At the end of the day you shouldn't be running condition based builds in pve anyway but even if you do, the damage on the Grandmaster CS trait is far too good to pass up. It's not a great build anyway but not running 30 CS for no apparent reason other than "flavour" makes no sense. Not investing 30 points in CS means you are doing it wrong given the current state of the Thief traits because it's staple. Telling me it can work isn't much of a counter-argument. If there was some ungodly Trickery Grandmaster Trait then maybe you might have something resembling a semi-coherent argument.

Look, this build is choosing to receive 4 initiative when using a healing skill and increasing damage by 1% per initiative instead of having a 10% damage increase when initiative is over 6 and 20% extra damage vs targets <50% health - this is an immense drop in damage especially when considering the passive stats (10% critical damage and 100 precision versus 10% steal recharge and 100 condition damage).

You notice how the only people in this thread to provide actual feedback have both put 30 points in Critical Strike? There is a very good reason for that.