Tactical Strike

Stealth Attack. Daze your foe by bashing them with your sword hilt. Daze them for a longer duration if you attack from behind or they are defiant. Applies vulnerability. — In-game description

Tactical Strike

Profession

Thief (skill list)

Weapon

Main hand sword

Type

Stealth Attack

Game link

API

13114

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1  

Tactical Strike

Stealth Attack. Daze your foe by bashing them with your sword hilt. Daze them for a longer duration if you attack from behind or they are defiant. Applies vulnerability.

 Damage: 734 (2.0)^?

 Damage: 488 (1.33)^?

 Damage: 403 (1.1)^?

 Daze: 1 second

 Daze from Behind: 3 seconds

 Daze from Behind: 2 seconds

₁₀ Vulnerability (5s): +10% Incoming Damage, +10% Incoming Condition Damage

 Defiance Break: 400[sic]

 Defiance Break: 300[sic]

 Range: 170

— In-game description

Related traits

Deadly Arts

• Even the Odds — Apply vulnerability when you steal. Gain might when you hit with a stealth attack.
• Exposed Weakness — Deal increased strike damage to your target for each unique condition on them.

Critical Strikes

• Sundering Shade — Stealth Attack skills inflict vulnerability and grant fury upon successfully hitting foes.

Shadow Arts

• Hidden Thief — Stealing inflicts blindness. Stealth Attacks inflict weakness. Cannot affect the same target more than once per interval.
• Shadow Siphoning — Stealth attacks siphon health if they hit. Cannot siphon the same target more than once per interval.
• Rending Shade — Steal boons from enemies you strike with stealth attacks. Striking a boonless foe with a stealth attack inflicts fear on nearby foes.

Trickery

• Pressure Striking — Enemies you interrupt are inflicted with torment. This trait can only affect enemies with defiance bars once per interval.

Daredevil

• Impacting Disruption — Recharge steal and inflict a pulmonary impact when you interrupt an enemy. This trait can only affect enemies with defiance bars once per interval.

Specter

• Panaku's Ambition — Gain barrier when you strike foes with a stealth attack. When you apply stealth to allies you also grant them barrier. This effect can only be received once and will reset when stealth is removed.

Notes

Bug:

The Defiance Break sums up daze from both sources: 100+300=400 for PvE and 100+200=300 for WvW and PvP instead of correctly displaying the values separately.

Version history

For a detailed skill history, see here.

Patch	Changes
August 20, 2024	Janthir Wilds release: Reduced the power coefficient from 1.33 to 1.1 in PvP only.
June 25, 2024	Increased the power coefficient from 1.33 to 2.0 in PvE only. Increased the daze duration while behind the enemy from 2 seconds to 3 seconds in PvE only.
March 19, 2024	This skill now dazes for 1 second instead of blinding when striking from the front. Increased the power coefficient from 1.0 to 1.33.
June 27, 2023	All effects that benefit when the player strikes from the flank or from behind now always apply their benefits when striking defiant foes.
February 28, 2022	End of Dragons release: (Undocumented) Added tooltip fact Defiance Break.
July 07, 2020	Icons for daze and stun are now displayed in light purple in skill and trait tooltips.
July 10, 2018	This attack now applies 10 stacks of vulnerability for 5 seconds on hit. This change extends to the deadeye variant Malicious Tactical Strike.
September 23, 2017	Fixed a bug in which this skill did less damage than intended.
August 08, 2017	Path of Fire pre-patch: This skill has been unsplit and now dazes for 2 seconds in all game modes when attacking from behind. Increased the damage by 33%.
July 26, 2016	All stealth attack skills will now have a 1-second recharge between uses.
July 23, 2013	Fixed the damage skill fact to display the proper amount of damage done.
April 30, 2013	Skills that must be performed from stealth are now labeled as "Stealth Attack."
November 15, 2012	This skill's damage has been increased by 10% in all formats. This skill's daze duration has been reduced from 2 seconds to 1.5 seconds in PvP.
October 24, 2012	Stealth skills now always apply the Revealed' buff when they hit their target (this update was not originally documented )
August 28, 2012	Game release: Tactical Strike has been added to the game.