Guild Wars 2

Before anyone says it’s bad. Yes, I know, I am capable of using the Google. However, I just made an Engineer who is currently level 16, and I’m hoping to ultimately have a flamethrower build on him. Because, you know….a bulky flamethrower wielding cat man sounds fun. Kinda just want it to wander around PvE, never been a big fan of PvP and I have yet to try WvW because I feel like I’ll irritate everyone with noobness. I just want to burn things when I feel upset, you know?
My current problem is, my main atm is my only level 80 and is a Ranger so…I don’t know much about Engineers. I’ve only been playing for a few months as well, so I’m still kinda new. But from what I’ve seen, I have Berserker crap on my Ranger and I’d like something different, so I’d prefer to run Condition Damage with this flamethrower and just watch the world burn. My problem is, most guides I can find online are pretty dated, and I’m not sure of all the changes that have been made since them.
I’ve seen a few Condition Damage builds that say to run the FT with the Elixir Gun, but again, I’m level 16 and it’s hard for me to really understand a lot of this without being able to use it in game yet. They say it’s best to prioritize Condition Damage and Power about equally, then try to have Toughness and Precision as the secondary stats. Is that a good idea? With some of the traits I’ve seen that Engi’s get, that seems pretty good, since they have a lot of stuff that can proc on crit, and Toughness from Juggernaut and such.
But…I’m not very good at figuring out exactly how I should hybrid this stuff. Any advice would be appreciated, and soz for being a noob. But if I saw correctly, the FT got a 33% damage boost, that’s gotta count for something, right? ;u ;

Some men just want to watch the world burn…

The flamethrower build doesn’t exist. It cannot be used. And that’s why it’s so friggin’ fun to use it.

If no one’s done it by tomorrow, I’ll hop onto my Engi and jot down some pointers for you.

I don’t use FT a lot so I’ll refrain from saying too much stuff I’m not sure about. But at a guess Condi+Power main would be very decent for PvE open world, especially if you focus on toughness as a third stat – engies are pretty darn tanky when they want to be and it is fun if you don’t mind taking a tad longer to kill stuff.

Consider using bomb kit as a secondary kit to use when your FT skills are on cooldown – the high auto-attack damage on bombkit plus the various combo fields and conditions should work well in combination & will help you keep burning on the mob to make use of that condi damage. The blinds from smoke bomb are also very nice if you drop the toughness for precision. Plus, y’know, bombing the heck out of annoying people inbetween flamethrower bursts sounds right up your alley.

The engineer’s flamethrower received a few boosts in the September 9th update:
- The #1 skill’s damage was boosted by 33%
- The #2 skill’s projectile detonation is now a Blast Finisher
- The #4 skill now pulses damage to foes standing inside its field
(A disadvantage is that the casting time for the #3 skill was increased to give it a clearer tell for PvP.)

What has not changed, is that the #1 skill generates a very fast sequence of hits, so any “on critical hit” effects could work well with flamethrower. For example, there are engineer traits and weapon sigils that deal out conditions on a critical hit. Therefore, both Berserker (Power, Precision, Ferocity) and Rampager (Power, Precision, Condition Damage) could work well.

We might be seeing more flamethrower engineers in the near future. At the very least least, the kit is worth another look.

Flamethrower just had a few changes made, so most people are still testing it out and probably won’t post builds just yet. This might be a good discussion to follow: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/engineer/Flamethrower-rocks-now/first#post4395417

There are many various FT builds. Many players have enjoyed using it since release. I suggest going to the “engineer” sub forums. There are multiple threads on the topic with various builds and write ups about how to use them and what the pros and cons are.