I completely agree with nearly all of the OP's assesments of the problems with Dagger users.
Backstab talent should be free (and more rewarding), Blackjacks would add nice flexibility, and Guerilla is utilized better by Str weapons.
4. Mobility skills. Mobility being baked into the passive bonus is nice, however, the fact that cloak and dagger is a higher cost tactical retreat, with a longer CD AND a downside is a bit silly. Placing smoke down at my initial point might be thematic, but all it's doing is obscuring my allies in smoke, making it more difficult for them to back me up. Now, smoke at my arrival location would be useful, cutting off my enemy from his allies and making it more difficult for enemies to target me.
#4 really confuses me. Cloak and Dagger is virtually identical to Tactical Retreat. There are only 2 differences. Cloak and Dagger can be used without breaking stealth, and Tactical Retreat adds a 1-turn haste buff to the user.
Range is the same, AP cost is the same, memory cost is the same. They're Huntsman/Scoundrel, respectively, but they are essentially the same ability.
The in-game skillbook reads "Teleport without breaking Sneaking", and this is the only behavior I noticed. Does it also do a smoke cloud in some cases?
Guerrilla is only good when:
- Attacking from out of combat to start a fight (0 AP cost).
- Using a skill which has powerful sneak attack damage already (The Skill is what's providing the power)
- If you need to finish an enemy off, but it would take 2 dual-wielding attacks and you have only 3 AP left. (Very situational and a questionable use of AP compared to other possible options)
That's it. It just does not seem useful to take a Talent point on.
There is another important/common scenario where using Guerilla helps not listed here.
I'll explain it with an example.
Let's say I have 6 AP pooled, and 2 abilities available, Crippling Blow and Sawtooth Knife.
Without Guerilla, I'd use Crippling Blow, Sawtooth Knife, and 1 basic attack (weak). 2AP+2AP+2AP
With Guerilla I can Guerilla+Crippling Blow and Guerilla+ Sawtooth Knife. 1+2AP and 1+2AP.
I was able to avoid using a much weaker regular attack and use all of my AP towards my higher scaling and/or AoE abilities.
Every 1 AP going towards a 2 AP skill is 1 more AP you don't spend doing your weakest thing, basic attacks.
If basic hits for 100 damage, Crippling hits 2 targets for 100 each, and Sawtooth hits for 120, the numbers would work out as follows:
Without Guerilla: 2*100+120+100 = 420 damage
With Guerilla: 1.5*(2*100+120)= 480 damage
Do you see what I'm saying?
And I have a second rebuttal: Guerrilla is a Badly Designed Talent because it is very situational. Most of the time you're better off using your AP for something else or saving it for the next turn. Even in the cases I outlined...
- Attacking from out of combat puts you into an unfavorable position in the turn order.
- You're using Sneak because of the power of the skill, and the skill is so powerful on its own that you can get benefits from it without needing Guerrilla.
- It can be very situational to have an enemy within 0 AP which will die from a dual-wielding backstab at 150% power AND the Rogue has 3 AP and does not have Adrenaline AND which no other party member could deal with instead.
I really doubt that you are going to be able to instantly kill something before a fight starts unless you're overleveled or are using a Source Point with Mortal Blow. Perhaps maybe a low HP enemy in the back. In that case, it's likely that the enemy was designed to have low HP, and even if your Rogue gets them, you are now starting out at a disadvantage because you're low in the turn order and in the enemy backlines, where there will be many more angry enemies.
I found Guerilla to be useful enough to warrant taking (after better talents), just not when using Daggers. This stands to highlight the OP's original point.
With a Bow user it's easy to Snipe off enemies, and it's easy to Guerilla up to buff every ability when one is far away. Guerilla is particularly important in this case, as 1-shotting an enemy often will not trigger a fight and finishing an enemy off entirely (instead of mostly) means they don't even get their 1st turn.
With a 2-handed weapon the added initial damage often let me 1-shot groups of enemies with Crippling Blow, although, I haven't played this style since the Crippling Blow nerf.
