Gearing towards the start, been reading guides for my fellow Thief. Came across that.

Does "applying venom applies buff to nearby allies" mean that ALL allies around me get to use my venom? Like, all 100 that are around me in WvWvW get to apply some hundred damage per hit venom each for some applications, so i'm giving like some hundred thousand damage buff to them?

Originally posted by IstrebiteI
... but its insane right? Erm..... Why would i use any other build in WvWvW as Thief then? Shouldnt this be fixed to like "up to 10 allies"?

I read somewhere that AoE only effects up to 5 people. Maybe this works the same way. Gotta look for more info.

a) This skill works in +/- meele range, so buffing 100 people is pretty hard

b) it probably counts as aoe,  "An area of effect skill may only affect a maximum of 5 targets" (from gw2 wiki)

Originally posted by Xzen

Originally posted by IstrebiteI
... but its insane right? Erm..... Why would i use any other build in WvWvW as Thief then? Shouldnt this be fixed to like "up to 10 allies"?

I read somewhere that AoE only effects up to 5 people. Maybe this works the same way. Gotta look for more info.

Best of my knowledge this is correct, but I've never gotten a chance to effectively test it.

cause yeah...passing, say...basilisk venom...to your entire WvW horde. Yeah. Ugly.

Originally posted by Arusu

a) This skill works in +/- meele range, so buffing 100 people is pretty hard

b) it probably counts as aoe,  "An area of effect skill may only affect a maximum of 5 targets" (from gw2 wiki)

Sounds like b) is the answer then. 5 targets.

Originally posted by IstrebiteI
Yeah, that seems more reasonable. Would help alot if ANet would specify it in the tooltips (like, what the AOE size is, and how many targets are affected, i'm used to exact and detailed tooltips from games like Dota and they help a lot!)

The tooltips in beta were only avalible in simplified version. Release will have more detailed ones. They didn't want people to go too hardcore on number crunching before the numbers are even final. 

They were not only simple, but incomplete, wrong and just hilarious sometimes. Dont remember exact one, on a pvp gem you put into armor, but it was ridiculous... a bit less fun was one that said "Gives XXX buff when underwater (not in)" - this one made me wonder for some time "what do they mean under water but not in... like, when i'm on land but below sea level?"

I hope this changes by release.

The Dev's posted in a FAQ on the beta boards and the answer is 5, nearly almost 5.

All the AoE abilities are based on group play, your boons hit 5 people, your conditions hit 5 people.  They were vauge on the smart targeting though.