Sneak Attack

Aerandir

Aerandir

Limit Breaker
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Dec 1, 2004
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I'm about to start lvling my 15 thf, getting it ready to sub to my drk.

I need to know when I should use sneak attack. I know that it deals extra damage, but without trick attack, I'll get the hate.

So...when is the best time to use it?
 
You should have capped evasion for thf at 15, so youll eva many attack and getting hit isnt too bad at this lvl.

Oh and please dont sub thf before drk 60
 
Early on, go ahead and activate sneak attack right before you pull or whenever the puller pulls. Sneak attack at the start of the fight when your timer is at 10 seconds or so. 10 seconds later do it again, preferably with a weaponskill on it. Thus, withint 10 seconds, you've already done more than your share of the damage. Will you get hit? Heck yes you will get hit. It's not like you're going to die though. You're a thief.

Don't sub /thf on a drk until 65 when you can do the thief abilities justice. Nothing short of spinning slash excuses the loss of double attack and berserk.
 
Flameass said:
Oh and please dont sub thf before drk 60
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LOL, I hadn't planned on it. I have a friend that just started playing, and he is getting close to 15, so I figure I'll show him noobland, aka Valkrum Dunes. Theif is the only job that I have to lvl to get my dark to 75, so I figured I would knock out two birds with one stone.

So the bottom line is, don't worry about timing, just do it. Right?
 
Do as much damage as you can with SA. If you get hate, blame the tank.
 
One other thing, for the love of god, dont main hand a dagger till level 33 (viper bite). SA+Fastblade 4tw

And keep in mind, if you SA to start, and then SA+Fast blade to close a weaponskill, you will be the tank for the rest of the fight... Keeping a little evasion gear to macro in cant hurt.
 
Ezikiel said:
One other thing, for the love of god, dont main hand a dagger till level 33 (viper bite). SA+Fastblade 4tw

And keep in mind, if you SA to start, and then SA+Fast blade to close a weaponskill, you will be the tank for the rest of the fight... Keeping a little evasion gear to macro in cant hurt.
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SA+Boost+Combo is pretty good too for the first few levels until gimped H2H skill starts to hurt.
 
I was never a fan of H2h-ing as a thief.
IMO the best setup is really thf/rng from 12-28. Not only do you get sa and sa/fast blade, but you get the DoT of a poor ranger, which is unfortunatley better than the DoT of the best thief. But I would not go /ranger unless your archery or mark was already capped from a previous job. If you couldn't go ranger, I would still sub monk...but not for the H2H.

@28 dual wield mithran scimitars when your dagger is capped 8)
Then at 30 you get berserk, which is really really really nice. Dunno if it beats dual mithrans until L33 though. I doubt it.
 
Flameass said:
You should have capped evasion for thf at 15, so youll eva many attack and getting hit isnt too bad at this lvl.
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In my experience, capped eva or not, you still won't evade much @ 15thf. It's not until the higher levels that THF's eva really "shines".
 
Just FYI, Spinning Slash is lvl 66 for drk, not 65. Carry on.
 
Good...now that im back again that will give me a little time to catch up to you ^^ (dont trust the sig...im at 43 and 3/4 right now :P)
 
I don't have as much experience with THF as the other posters here, but I'll share what worked for me.

I did thf/war initially for the added strength. I switched to thf/nin at level 20 for dual wield. The additive delay of dual wield means that you don't really build TP faster until your nin sub is lv 25 (I haven't reached that point). But you can off-hand a weapon that adds stat bonuses for an edge.

At lv 24 thf/nin was an advantage due to utsusemi, and not just for me as thf. A SA at the start would get hate, but not too much that the tank couldn't get it back before my 6 shadows were gone. One minute later SA+WS easily got hate again. Most of the time this would save the whm some mp. I found it especially useful with a NIN/WAR tank; pre level 37 their shadows get used up pretty fast and taking a few attacks for them at the right time was a boon.

Like most everyone else here, I'd say to use SA+ Fast Blade until you get Viper Bite. But still have a dagger handy and keep your dagger skill capped or close to cap. You will occasionally run into a party where you can't close a SC with Fast Blade.

Finally, try making your own party when you can: NIN/WAR, WHM, BLM, THF/NIN x3. Have a SA order, and each person runs behind the "tank" after SA so the next person can line up for SA. Mandies just outside of Kahzam will last about 40 seconds each with this set up, and the whm will use very little mp due to having 4 blink tanks (effectively).
 
Now see, that's something I've never seriously tried but always wanted to...thiefburn. I think it could rival the best specialty parties, especially for the first 60 levels. I would like to get 6 thieves together, practice for a couple hours, then Fraps the group against a high Kindred Warrior. Instant legendary video right there.
 
Peregrine said:
Now see, that's something I've never seriously tried but always wanted to...thiefburn. I think it could rival the best specialty parties, especially for the first 60 levels. I would like to get 6 thieves together, practice for a couple hours, then Fraps the group against a high Kindred Warrior. Instant legendary video right there.
Click to expand...

<<level 25 THF/NIN If your interested in doing this sometime in November I'll happily join up to try that. It sounds like fun.
 
Maybe I'll make an event. Dunno how many people would be interested in going into a level-capped area and just goofing around though.
 
I'd be interested. THF/NIN is at 30, not super awesome gear, but it's far from gimped (though I'm sure a few THF would probably disagree).
 
Actually Aer, @ lvl 15 you really don't wanna pop SA right off. You'll pull hate right away and become an MP drain on the pty also causing it to be easier to pull hate from the tank from Blm, or WS etc.

What you wanna do until crabs in qufim is wait about 10-15 secs to allow the tank to get proper hate, then bust it, and even if you manage to get hate the tank will have voke ready shortly after.
 
..

..to be honest i dont invite thfs on any of my jobs till atleast lv30.. lol.. other classes will do higher DoT..

~nib
 
thx guys

What I've been doing is what was last suggested. I wait about 20 seconds after first voke to use sneak, that way he can voke it off of me after only a hit or two.

I haven't however been leveling my dagger. I guess I can put that on my list of gimped weapons to lvl.

I won't be taking thf past 37, possibly 45 if I really want TH2.

Do you think I can get by without it?
 
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