A few Much-needed changes to the Thief

Hate to say it, but the Thief has issues. Unless you send 50 of them at a base and get really lucky, their only benefit is they can swim to those outhouses hidden in the corner much faster than any other unit. She could use some rebalancing, maybe a toughness boost, or increase the steal rate skills, but there are two

1. Fix "Who Goes There?" - The description for this skill is misleading, and the skill is useless. Both need to be changed.

Perception: Based on the skill's description, most people believe that when the skill is triggered, she turns invisible for a set period of time, and can drain storages with impunity, unless she touches water or is hit by enemy fire.

Reality: Invisibility is canceled the second she attacks anything, (usually a wall or storage). Storage is almost always well-defended, so she will be splattered within 1-2 seconds by a single shot from any defense. Some people say "Well, just take out those defenses with other troops" But if you do that, you don't need the thief. Those troops will take care of the storage just fine.

Fix: The Thief needs to either:

-retain invisibility for a short period (3-8 seconds) after attacking. She'll still get splattered the instant she uncloaks, but at least she'll actually be able to steal more than double-digit resources

-Stay invisible for a set period (30-40 seconds), even while attacking. Ideally, the skill should last long enough for her to make it to a protected storage, and steal for a few seconds. Contact with water or enemy fire should still negate the skill, though.


2. Ability to evade and disarm traps (@Gangrene Beard , @Bear) In every RPG since D&D, evading and disarming traps is what thieves do best. Besides stealing, of course.


3. Ability to Dodge some attacks: (@Kizmatti) Replace Who Goes There? or one of the lesser skills (like Acad5 +5 Toughness) with a new Passive "Dodge" Skill. This would allow Thief a % chance to evade attacks, and/or a % chance to reduce damage dealt from each attack. Ideally, this bonus would increase a small amount with each trained Speed boost skill.

4. Ability to leap over walls (@Skull Bozu ) - Possibly as a natural skill, or an upgradeable passive skill. Wall-jumping is something thieves should be very good at.

 

I think I used thief's twice. So bad I even gave up upgrading them

 

I agree thief is gimped.

Also agree she should retain invisiblity for 3-4 seconds after attacking (storages only). 30-40 seconds would be way overpowered.

Evading and disarming traps is a skill that was givin to Jugs, which is fine thief would die way to fast anyway.

 

Just to be clear, the 30-40 seconds version is pretty much the same as the 3-4 seconds after attacking. It should give just enough time to run to a storage, and do a little damage before uncloaking

 

Understand

I think the Thief is a tuff troop to balance. An invis skill either is gonna work or it doesn't.

Any PH 6+ base has the storages walled in with the defensive structures. Even with a 3-4 second before invis drops I still wouldn't make them for there grog cost, as they gonna die as soon as they appear.

My gunners are still better, and cheaper to make.

I think she needs a tweek to her current skill altogether

Like a dodge skill rather than invis, can evade % of attacks or a certain % of the damage being dealt or both to some degree.

More flexibility in balancing the skill. With dodge you get a skill check with every attack that it will work to some degree, which could realistically help with survival without becoming overpowered if balanced and tested.

Just not sure how invis could ever be balanced to work where it isn't either overpowered, or like it is now, completely useless.

 

Yea.. I second third and forth the idea of Thieves disarming traps!

 

I was suprised to see Jugs have this skill. Kinda makes sense from a durabilty standpoint thou.RP wise should definately be the Thief. To bad she's already taken a dirt nap.

They need to come out with different types of traps and more of them able to be placed. Right now I dont think traps have a big enough effect on the game that it really matters.

 

That might make them useful. I've experimented a bit over the last week, and have yet to really find them useful. Even for farming, seems just easier to have gunners and brutes or juggs and just place them as best I can for a higher farming rate.

 

All great points. I really like the dodge idea. Of course it wouldn't work with splash damage, but it might give her an edge. After all, she does have all those speed bonuses. I'm going to add this to my original post, if you don't mind?

 

Also, I think a leap skill would be nice to hurdle walls while invis.

 

An inherent ability at higher levels, not a spell

 

yes. thieves should be learned in sneaking over walls as well as defenses.

 

By all means.

 

I like it. I'll add it

 

Leap skill could be cool. Thief should get to the grog/gold the quickest.

 

These are great ideas, I like all of them (honestly). Thief could really use some tweaks to make her more useful.

 

So glad to see the added my idea about a few more seconds invisibility after attacking. I heart Midoki sometimes.

 

I always keep a couple thieves on hand so fast

 

Well now with the new update/patch, there is now an perk unlocked at level 7 academy which let makes it so the thief stays invisible for 5 seconds even after she starts attacking a building. But I think that that perk is unlocked waaay to far in the game to even care about it because no one even uses thieves up in the higher ranks they could release a couple new patches to fix this but I highly doubt that they even will.

 

I'm definitely going to be using it if I need some quick loot and don't feel like controlling a real army