Shadow arts is skilless garbage

[Armen.1483]

> @"kash.9213" said:

 

> It probably wont help any and shouldn't be considered when designing counter play to stealth, but there is a very fast and kind of subtle blur at the beginning of a stealth pop and that is where I try to catch a thief opener or cut off a mesmer portal. I keep my camera pan speed fast and am always scanning around the area which is how you can, spot a stealth plot, and read someone going into stealth and check their tells like stealth whisps from skills and their orientation on the ground can give a way some of their thought. Most of the time from reading the tells, you can feel where they'll come out for an interrupt or pull or be able to orient and react to an opener. I don't mind fighting stealth, there are tells and it's an easier paced fight but something like Binding Shadow or anything that launches or travels similarly from stealth is just dumb and can compound other gimmicks that make stealth play frustrating.

 

That is exactly what most of us are trying to do. While it is quite difficult to do during a fight which is the most cases of encounters (becasue of the +1s), thieves sometimes engage in a 1vs1 too which they are not supposed to win, but hey it is the meta now. Let's imagine I am capping a node alone, got all my cds and even see that thief stealth not far away from me trying to attack me. Best scenario for me and worst for thief. So my question here: what should my play be ? Okay I can try to guess the dodge, and with heaven's help I dodged his opener and survived. What should I do next ? Thief is gone. I capped the node, but still waiting for another attack at any moment. And all the games are like that. Unless thief failes everything and commits like there is no tomorrow it is quite frustrating to deal with them. Maybe I just suck at it, but as far as I can see, it is not just me, nearly everyone has similar issues. If you could help me with dealing with them, I'd appreciate that.

[kash.9213]

> @"Armen.1483" said:

> > @"kash.9213" said:

>

> > It probably wont help any and shouldn't be considered when designing counter play to stealth, but there is a very fast and kind of subtle blur at the beginning of a stealth pop and that is where I try to catch a thief opener or cut off a mesmer portal. I keep my camera pan speed fast and am always scanning around the area which is how you can, spot a stealth plot, and read someone going into stealth and check their tells like stealth whisps from skills and their orientation on the ground can give a way some of their thought. Most of the time from reading the tells, you can feel where they'll come out for an interrupt or pull or be able to orient and react to an opener. I don't mind fighting stealth, there are tells and it's an easier paced fight but something like Binding Shadow or anything that launches or travels similarly from stealth is just dumb and can compound other gimmicks that make stealth play frustrating.

>

> That is exactly what most of us are trying to do. While it is quite difficult to do during a fight which is the most cases of encounters (becasue of the +1s), thieves sometimes engage in a 1vs1 too which they are not supposed to win, but hey it is the meta now. Let's imagine I am capping a node alone, got all my cds and even see that thief stealth not far away from me trying to attack me. Best scenario for me and worst for thief. So my question here: what should my play be ? Okay **I can try to guess the dodge**, and with heaven's help I dodged his opener and survived. What should I do next ? Thief is gone. I capped the node, but still waiting for another attack at any moment. And all the games are like that. Unless thief failes everything and commits like there is no tomorrow it is quite frustrating to deal with them. Maybe I just suck at it, but as far as I can see, it is not just me, nearly everyone has similar issues. If you could help me with dealing with them, I'd appreciate that.

 

Like I said I probably can't help and WvW is my game mode so I probably can't translate what works very well anyway. I wouldn't rely on "guessing", when I fight a thief I know they have to budget resources and stagger things out also and they have to try to not mess up. That moment they come out of stealth is what people fear and players will scramble but that is when a stealth player doesn't want to get pulled, interrupted, and controlled in general. I'm not making a case for stealth play by the way, I get bored with it also, I'm just giving a picture of what I do from adjusting along the way and it's also what I notice people observe about me when in a fight so it's what I'm tuned into since I'm trying to not die.

 

Call me lazy but I pack a lot of control and boon steal in my build and play like everyone's got a breakbar. If they're living through it, they know they're too vulnerable to stick around for a +1 or whatever.

[saerni.2584]

> @"Armen.1483" said:

> > @"kash.9213" said:

>

> > It probably wont help any and shouldn't be considered when designing counter play to stealth, but there is a very fast and kind of subtle blur at the beginning of a stealth pop and that is where I try to catch a thief opener or cut off a mesmer portal. I keep my camera pan speed fast and am always scanning around the area which is how you can, spot a stealth plot, and read someone going into stealth and check their tells like stealth whisps from skills and their orientation on the ground can give a way some of their thought. Most of the time from reading the tells, you can feel where they'll come out for an interrupt or pull or be able to orient and react to an opener. I don't mind fighting stealth, there are tells and it's an easier paced fight but something like Binding Shadow or anything that launches or travels similarly from stealth is just dumb and can compound other gimmicks that make stealth play frustrating.

>

> That is exactly what most of us are trying to do. While it is quite difficult to do during a fight which is the most cases of encounters (becasue of the +1s), thieves sometimes engage in a 1vs1 too which they are not supposed to win, but hey it is the meta now. Let's imagine I am capping a node alone, got all my cds and even see that thief stealth not far away from me trying to attack me. Best scenario for me and worst for thief. So my question here: what should my play be ? Okay I can try to guess the dodge, and with heaven's help I dodged his opener and survived. What should I do next ? Thief is gone. I capped the node, but still waiting for another attack at any moment. And all the games are like that. Unless thief failes everything and commits like there is no tomorrow it is quite frustrating to deal with them. Maybe I just suck at it, but as far as I can see, it is not just me, nearly everyone has similar issues. If you could help me with dealing with them, I'd appreciate that.

 

Thief could always win 1v1s. The issue was that thief mobility meant that thief was better off using that to +1 or decap rather than stay in a 1v1 and possibly be +1ed themselves.

 

Of course, thief is frustrating when it doesn’t commit fully to a fight and gets away. But, it’s a team point holding game. That thief wasted time attacking you and you got the node. If the thief commits then you can certainly beat them if everything else (build, skill, etc) is equal.

 

 

General advice:

 

1. Stay mobile.

2. Use terrain to block teleports and line of sight.

3. Rotate with your team if you can’t handle the thief. The worst games from a thief perspective happen when your team insta-dies and you are constantly chased by 2-3 players off every single node. They might not kill you but...you won’t be winning that game.

[ASP.8093]

> @"Armen.1483" said:

> thieves sometimes engage in a 1vs1 too which they are not supposed to win

 

The point isn't that thieves shouldn't ever win a 1v1, it's that their 1v1s aren't productive in terms of overall score.

 

Like you said: you capped the node. If they push you again, that node's going to stay capped pretty much the whole time you're fighting.

 

Heck, even if you just started a decap, and you get into a protracted skirmish with a thief, that node might full cap while you're fighting back and forth. I've certainly had this experience from the opposite perspective -- winning a series of 1v1s from enemy players trickling in but getting zero value out of it because stealth use and glass-cannon positional play force me to give up the node. *That's* why stealth (beyond like a single "gtfo" skill) is a net liability for duelist types.

[Armen.1483]

thx for the tips guys !!!

[Xervite.5493]

Shadow arts is really strong in pvp and wvw. It also synergizes very well with Deadeye for both offense and defence. You can literally spam death's judgment if you play it right and ofc you can disengage/rez other players safely