Build:Daredevil - Power S/D Roamer

The community gave this build a rating, making it top-tier: Great

Focused on: Strike damage and Mobility

Designed for: WvW Roaming

Difficulty:

Normal

This build was last updated on January 12, 2024 and is up to date for the October 8, 2024 patch.

Overview

A Daredevil take on Sword/Dagger Thief for WvW roaming. This mix of evasions, boon stealing and unblockable damage makes for a rather slippery build and a great duelist. S/D allows the user to briefly go toe-to-toe with their opponents while jumping in and out of fights as they see fit.

Skill Bar

Sword/Dagger

Shortbow

Utility

Skill Variants

Utility

• Impairing Daggers - adds more burst damage to the build. Consider using Steal right before the first projectile goes off in order to cut down on travel time/distance, making the skill harder to avoid.

• Signet of Agility - good passive bonus and extra cleansing/evasion on active.

• Infiltrator's Signet - primarily used to chase down targets. If you need to break stun with it and don't want to remain right next to your opponent, you can use NPCs and other players as targets to teleport to.

• Scorpion Wire - a ranged pull on short CD. Good at closing gaps, interrupting skills and setting up skills like Cloak and Dagger without spending initiative.

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Specializations

Variants

• Take Escapist's Fortitude if you're having trouble facing condition builds.

Specialization Variants

Critical Strikes over Deadly Arts - this version of the build trades some utility such as CD resets and more access to stolen items for more burst damage:

Equipment

Head
Berserker

Shoulders
Berserker

Chest
Berserker

Hands
Berserker

Legs
Berserker

Feet
Berserker

Backpiece
Marauder

Accessory
Marauder

Accessory
Marauder

Amulet
Marauder

Ring
Marauder

Ring
Marauder

Sword
Marauder

Dagger
Marauder

Sigil

Sigil

Shortbow
Marauder

Sigil

Sigil

Rune
x6

Infusion
x18

Relic

Stats

• The ratio of Marauder and Berserker gear pieces partly comes down to personal preferences. As a general guideline, try to aim for ~17k HP when getting the gear. Rune options and traits like Marauder's Resilience can both affect your maximum HP so plan with those in mind.

Sigils

Shortbow

• If you don't want to bother with Sigil of Superior Sigil of Bloodlust take Sigil of Superior Sigil of Cleansing for more sustain.

Consumables

Food

• - good stats and passive damage mitigation.

• - same stats as the food above except with life steal instead of damage mitigation.

• - non-ascended version of the food above, without the sustain.

• - crit chance bump with armor ignoring damage procs which also heal.

• - mainly a budget defensive food that provides more frequent access to dodging.

Utility

• or

Usage

General

• Dodge if you need Swiftness or extra mobility in general while chasing someone down or disengaging.

• The many dodges and evasions on weapon sets provide decent survivability for an otherwise very squishy profession.

Steal

• Steal is the most powerful tool in a thief's kit and should not be wasted! Do not start fights with steal, keep it for the right moment (mainly to interupt important skills such as heals or elites).

• Steal refills endurance, grants initiative, inflicts Poison, does damage, heals for ~2k, and provides a variety of boons for you and your team. Its most important function however is the instant, unblockable interrupt.
  • When playing with Bountiful Theft the instant boonstrip prioritizes Stability, which goes off before the Daze does, allowing you to interrupt targets with Stability with just one button!

• Steal procs the damage bonus of Relic of Fireworks, creating a burst window for you.

Sword/Dagger

The main set of the build

• Most of the damage will come from a combination of autoattacks and the Flanking Strike (thief dual) chain.

• Infiltrator's Strike is an excellent skill for initiating fights or just closing gaps. If the terrain allows for it, it's recommended that you start fights with this skill from a place that break line of sight (LoS), like a wall or a pillar. This leaves you with an escape route via Infiltrator's Return in case you get focused, and IR even provides some minor cleansing.
  • Against dangerous targets with a lot of damage, keep jumping in and out of melee range with Infiltrator's Strike to minimize contact.

• Don't spam Flanking Strike (thief dual) mindlessly. You will become easily predictible and locked in an animation while your enemy can set up burst. Find a balance between your autoattacks and Flanking Strike. Both this skill and its chain Larcenous Strike are unblockable. Larcenous Strike will be your main source of burst damage.

• Dancing Dagger is merely a filler for ranged poking in case going into melee range would be too dangerous and Short bow is on CD, or if you want to get rid of Aegis / Blind before jumping in. The bouncing attacks however aren't all that bad when it comes to clearing Mesmer clones.

• Cloak and Dagger is strong in its own right. Being the only source of Stealth in the build, this grants access to Tactical Strike which can help with interrupting important casts (heal, stomp, etc.) when Steal is on cooldown, and the stealth in general can help you lose aggro for a short while or even leave the fight entirely without being chased. The damage itself is quite good both on CnD and Tactical Strike, which means chaining these 2 could act as a burst combo as well. With Steal added to the mix in the middle of casting CnD this combo becomes harder to avoid.
  • CnD could be used on AI (clones, pets, minions) if all you need is stealth not the damage, as AI won't dodge it therefore the odds of getting a successful CnD off becomes higher.

Short bow

Utility weapon

• Cluster Bomb being a spammable blast finisher has high value in groups when it comes to blasting fields for Stealth or healing (although they'll have to provide the fields).
  • Its chain skill Detonate Cluster is a solid cource of downed cleave, or even ranged burst if you pre-cast Cluster Bomb aimed at your feet, Steal near the end of the animation and then detonate at your target.

• Disabling Shot (thief short bow) provides cheap and spammable evasion in case you're being focused by the enemy team and your defensive skills are on CD. Remains usable even while Immobilized.

• Use Choking Gas on downed enemies especially if they are being revived - Poison decreases healing gained by 33% which affects resurrecting speed.

• Infiltrator's Arrow is mostly used for leaving fights if you're losing.

Utilities & elite

• Signet of Agility is your best souce of cleansing, as it instantly removes 3 conditions. In addition to that, this also gives an entire dodge roll's worth of endurance which can be used as a last resort option for squeezing out more dodges when you're out of endurance and don't have time to heal. Keep in mind that the active portion of this skill is AoE! Try to use it near allies whenever possible.

• Shadowstep is easily the most versatile and one of the strongest skills in the build. It has 2 parts:
  • The first half is a stun break and teleport, which already has countless applications. A few applications include teleport to safety while pressured, extending your reach in combat, or using the instant mobility boost to decap enemy points before using the 2nd part of the skill to leave just as fast.
  • The second half is called Shadow Return. This skill becomes available for 10 seconds after using Shadowstep, and cures 3 conditions in addition to breaking stun again before returning you to your starting location.
  • These can also be combined to safe stomp targets: begin stomping, Shadowstep away to safety, and then follow up with Shadow Return at the end of the animation in order to finish the target.

• Dagger Storm is a defensive elite. The rather lengthy evade frame with increased movement speed makes it an excellent panic button when you're being focused by the enemy team.
  • Note: skills like Shocking Aura or Line of Warding are able to interrupt Dagger Storm, so don't be completely careless.

Top Streamers

• Twitch: Blacksteeel