Guild Wars 2

This topic will attempt to codify and summarise a TL;DR version of the upcoming changes to Engineer in December 10. I will post my own opinion at the end; however, I feel that a separate thread posted here on the PVP forums will centre the conversation more around the competitive aspects of Engineer; why the meta build for Engineer is the way it is, and possible future directions the Engineer class can take. The OP may very well stretch several posts; make no mistake. Summarising 480 and growing posts will not be a short task.

This is the thread I am quoting from, in case anyone wants to wade through 10 pages

Before anything happens I would just like to repost the changes specific to Engineer:

Hebee.8460:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Dec-10th-Balance-Preview/first#post3133104

Bringing up Engineer:

Engineer:
We wanted to maintain the engineer’s core roles while still increasing build diversity. We also wanted to take out some of the random effects for some of the class’s traits. The biggest change here is allowing Modified Ammunition to work with any skills so that an engineer, regardless of build, can look at putting 30 points into firearms. By increasing the swiftness duration on Speedy Kits, we hope to allow Swiftness to be maintained more reasonably without having to constantly be swapping between Kits. This change will also bring down the total up time for Vigor due to its interaction with Invigorating Speed. We don’t like classes having permanent Vigor, and this is one of the areas we needed to tone down the up time of the engineer’s Vigor.
•Explosives V – Incendiary Powder. Moved to Master tier.
•Explosives VI – Exploit Weakness. Increased the health threshold from 25% to 50%
•Explosives IX – Accelerant packed turrets. Moved to Adept tier.
•Firearms XI – Modified Ammunition. This trait now works regardless of equipped weapon.
•Inventions V – Energized Armor. Increased conversion from 5% to 7%.
•Inventions X – Autotool Installation. Increased healing percent from 1% to 5%. * Decreased interval from 10s to 3s.
•Inventions XI – Elixir Infused bombs. Increased healing scaling by 50%.
•Alchemy V – Blood Injection. Increased conversion from 5% to 7%.
•Alchemy 15 – Transmute. Increased % chance from 8% to 100%. This effect can now only trigger once every 15 seconds.
•Tools VI – Speedy Kits. Increased Swiftness duration to 10s. This effect can now only trigger once every 10 seconds.
•Tools XI – Armor Mods. Changed this to now trigger on struck instead of on critical hit incoming. Reduced the cooldown from 25 seconds to 15 seconds

My first series of quoted posts will concentrate on the movement of Incendiary Powder up to Master Tier.
Edit: Editing in Saki Asukara’s post RE: Incendiary Powder nerf causing FT builds to be marginalised further as it is a good example of unintended consequences

Bubalobrown.9170:

• Incendiary Powder moved to Master Tier
• Speedy Kits increased Swiftness duration to 10s, ICD 10s
  Thats one way to promote build diversity I guess. Nerfing almost all of our specs… At least its not just our perma vigor being nerfed though.
  I can accept incendiary powder going up since its so good.

Yamsandjams.3267:

Terrahero.9358:

Inc Powder is now Master tier.

I am not actually surprised it is moved to the master tier because it was arguably one of the bests traits in the entire explosives line that could be acquired by 10-dipping.
For instance, 3 out of the 5 specs I consistently run put 10 into explosives for incendiary powder: SD Burst (bonus DPS); FT/EG Healing support (Will take DPS hit but not crux); P/P roamer (burning was large component of condi DPS)

Maderas.9741:

The issue is that it really screws non-grenade condition users, which is a popular build in PvP. Disappointing. I wish our power builds were more impressive.

Ahlen.7591:

That incendiary change is beyond brutal. Kills Pistol/HGH build. =/

Adamantium.3682:

As for the rest of the changes I’m not sure how I feel. Incendiary Powder quickly loses effectiveness in AOE situations, but it was undoubtedly the best trait to grab in non nade/bomb builds that wanted some points put into the power line.

Singer.8740:

The one true nerf we got was moving incendiary powder to master but even that is reasonable considering the power of the ability, just be grateful its not going GM.

coglin.1867:

I am curious as to what trait will be moving into the explosives adept tier with incendiary powder moving.

Sylentir.8913:

The incendiary powder change is regrettable, and I don’t especially see why that needed to move to the next tier up.

dragonkain.3984:

Incendiary powder nerf=ALL engi builds hurt with that, whole class nerfed pretty much.

Linc.6834:

The thing I don’t get is Incendiary powder was already nerfed to adept tier a couple months ago, from 100% burn uptime to 40%.
But moving it to master tier because it “forced engi’s to take 10 points in explosives” makes no sense whatsoever. Engi’s are “forced” to take it because there are literally NO other options. So how is moving our best option further away “opening up more build options”?

Saki Asakura.6479:

So, from a FT engi’s perspective, the change to IP is huge. FT is already very trait heavy, with a pretty much mandatory 20 Firearms 20 Alchemy 10 tools (for speedy kits), leaving only 20 points left, all of which would have to be put into explosives to get IP. This means FT engis have to do one of three things
-Give up their last trait selection (IE no HGH, speedy Gadgets, Protective Shield, etc)
-Give up one of their core traits (Juggernaut, speedy kits, deadly mixture)
-Give up incendiary powder.

IP was one of the only things that was making up for FT otherwise lackluster damage. It synergizes well, triggering often because of the rapid attack from Flame Jet and activating the +10% damage to burning foes effect. Without it FT builds take a huge damage hit.

Ahlen.7591:

JonPeters.5630:

One more thing I forgot to mention. The nice thing about Incendiary Powder was that it was a nice build neutral go to for adept tier. Right now the new build neutral traits there are Exploit Weakness and Empowering Adrenaline. I think a good discussion might be why these are not up to par as build neutral adept tier explosives traits.

Jon

Because they’re both inconsistent and terrible?

(WRT: Same post that Jon Peters made RE: Why Exploit Weakness and Empowering Adrenaline are terrible)

Banumiel.1926:

Engi is the class with minor DPS, so we are looking for sources of damage. Exploit weakness not deals damage and Empowering Adrenaline is a laughable damage because all the competitive builds are conditions builds, not power.

Engi problems:
-Rifle is meh, SD is funny for hot joins, but power builds are not viable seriously
-Turrets are a joke (except Healing Turret)
-Gadgets are a joke (except Rocket Boots)

Manuhell.2759:

Imho, almost every engineer uses that because it works with anything, something we can’t say for many of other traits, especially adept ones.

NevirSayDie.6235:

Incendiary powder will stay just as crucial for most engineer tournament builds. Basically this just nerfs the explosive master traits because engineers now can’t take them. It’s unfortunate, but it’s the way it is.

cottage.3274:

i have known a change to incendiary powder & perma vigor would come its very much justified but i never in a million years thought its will be without any real compensation.

Malhavoc Adhamar.3675:

While I can understand the move I can’t say I agree with it. It now means that you’re going to lack the build diversity that the engineer normally would have because people are now having to put 20 into explosives rather than the 10 they had left over after putting points into their core build. Not only this but it’s now fighting with Enhance Performance and Short Fuse.

Dirame.8521:

I think when people discuss Incendiary powder, they also discuss reducing the passive play in the game. I would have hoped that this is what you guys would be working on and I’m left wondering why you are still on the road of things activating passively.
Side note, Autodefense Bomb dispenser is a master trait at best. Just like the Auto Bomb Dispenser, I think there are still quite a few traits that need tweaking to become something worth taking. But if those traits are what you guys are focusing on, those are the things I’d find interesting if I saw them.

Explosive Powder; Merge with Shrapnel. Explosions deal 10% more damage. Successful blast finishes cause 3 stacks of Bleeding and burning.

JonPeters.5630:

Ok I had some time to talk through some of the engineer discussion. Overall Engineer is in a difficult place because they have a ton of good adept traits, not a lot of good master traits, and again a good # of grandmasters so you end up spreading points fairly diversly to get all the good adept traits but lose out on a lot of power by failing to get as many grandmaster traits. Here is what I see a lot of talk about:

Incendiary Powder
Moving this was just something that was a long time coming. It was simply forcing almost every engineer into 10 points in Explosives which was really hurting build diversity. We have tried to counter this by improving other triats that might now be reachable by dropping those 10 points. For example Modified Ammunition, Elixir Infuxed Bombs, and Armor Mods. Now all three of these lines, some more than others, have a strong reason to invest 30 points to match the strong grandmasters already in the other lines.Grenadier, Autodefense Bomb Dispenser, HGH, and Automated Response.

And now, Ostrich Eggs reply to Jon Peters that I feel encapsulates the sentiment of a lot of Engineers in all three arenas of PvP, PvE and WvW:

Ostricheggs.3742:

The change to incendiary does absolutely nothing to the trait except move it up to master tier. This might seem like a good idea on paper; incendiary is too strong to maintain its position as an adept trait and would work better as a master trait. But simple reality is far different.

Quite literally the only thing that this change does is limit the viability of fringe builds that might have had a shot in the meta but nobody plays them. It doesn’t do anything to limit the most powerful build (and in my opinion overpowered build) that engis have in their kitten nal, the bomb/nade build. Simply put it pigeon holes us into going bomb/nade if we wish to do condi damage because the trait spread is unaffected by the change to incendiary.

The first example of the aforementioned nerfed builds that I can give would be HGH nades. Because incendiary powder would now compete with both short fuse, enhance performance AND explosive powder it limits the capability of HGH substantially. The only adept trait even worth looking at would be shrapnel which is simply too underwhelming and RNG to take and do as well with. As a matter of fact any build that chooses to go nades for condi damage without taking bombs with radius is going to take a hit so hard that it’ll be hard to justify running them.

The next example would be non-nade condi builds. I’ve been experimenting a decent bit over the last month with them and ALL of them go 10 up explosives to grab incendiary. Some of them even teeter on the precipice of being viable but simply do not fit my playstyle to play extensively. There is absolutely no point in nerfing these builds because they are not being used by anyone, let alone being used effectively enough to justify such a serious nerf.

And AGAIN, none of these examples do not even come close to being as strong as the monstrous bomb/nade build.

Ostricheggs.3742:

JonPeters.5630:

One more thing I forgot to mention. The nice thing about Incendiary Powder was that it was a nice build neutral go to for adept tier. Right now the new build neutral traits there are Exploit Weakness and Empowering Adrenaline. I think a good discussion might be why these are not up to par as build neutral adept tier explosives traits.

Jon

Because they aren’t quite literally the crux of every condition engi build out there at the moment. It’s impossible to bring either trait up to par with incendiary without fundamentally changing how they work.

Empowering adrenaline is underwhelming in the sense that it’s a very minor damage increase which is tied to your endurance… Exploit weakness is underwhelming in the sense that you don’t really gain any utility and its tied to a health threshhold…

Again, from a developers standpoint the idea of havign such an incredible trait on adept tier is quite a problem. But the simple reality of engineers is that our damage is sub-par compared to every other class in the game without it…

Wow good posts. I agree 100% with OE.

The only way to fix this in my eyes is by buffing, adding or changing other traits to make them viable impactfull alternatives. Nerf IP and keep it in that traitline while buffing dmg in other areas is what i would do.

What follows is my opinion, and my opinion only. I will give it in bullet points in an effort to remain concise and to the point; however, I believe Ostrich Eggs’s post has outlined many ongoing issues with Engineer and the Incendiary Powder nerf exposes one of the current flaws of Engineer trait design

• Incendiary Powder in the Adept line gave an unprecendented 4 seconds of Burning as a 100% crit proc. Passive; and counterplay revolved around playing around a 10 second timer, and relying on the Engineer’s AOE based kitten nal to hit something other than you

• Previous iteration was 66% chance on critical for 2 seconds ICD 3 seconds. Condition duration runes and a Smouldering sigil enabled 100% burning uptime and Teldo’s Node Fighter 100% burning uptime build became the breakout spec for Engineer as a farpoint assault condi based spec and it was really the seminal build for Rabid condi-pressure for Engineer.

• Complaints levelled against Incendiary Powder mainly centre around it being a passive crit-proc with intransparent counterplay. As a crit proc in 1v1s you can spam AOE – especially with Grenadier to “roll the dice” so often you proc it on ICD

• From a theorycrafting perspective, there is no other trait in Explosives 10 that is as build-agnostic or as universally applicable as Incendiary Powder. You may notice earlier posts from other people arguing that the Incendiary Powder trait was taken not because “Engineers are forced into it” but because there is simply nothing much else worth taking

• Dirame’s point about a passive proc brings up an important aspect of the ongoing trend of certain traits having high efficacy – whilst being triggered outside of the normal game design of GW2 having skills, cooldowns and casting times . Incendiary Powder is maligned because it does not change the Engineer playstyle – you play the same as you do before – only now you have 40% Burning uptime for extra DPS. You don’t burn a cooldown so much as you trigger it on ICD and I believe that this becomes a point of contention for Incendiary Powder’s critics.

• I believe that a case can be made for Incendiary Powder requiring the use of cooldowns by incorporating the Toolbelt mechanic.

If Incendiary Powder were instead nerfed to:

• “For the next 2 seconds after activating a Toolbelt skill, your next critical hit has a 100% chance to cause Burning for 4 seconds (Cooldown 15 seconds)
  This would severely curtail the Burning uptime of the meta Bomb/Nade build to only 2 activations over the course of 30 seconds unless you also ran a short CD Toolbelt skill like Rifle Turret.

• The above change tackles the twofold problem of a passive proc by requiring the use of a Toolbelt skill to trigger; whilst retaining the Precision requirement of getting a crit in the next 2 seconds (Meanwhile, introduces counterplay if the “Incendiary Powder” buff turned up on the Boon bar so you could start to dodge)
  At the same time, Bomb/Nade would no longer be able to efficiently run Elixir R or Elixir S without considering curtailing their Burning uptime

My next series of posts will address the Invigorating Speed/Speedy Kits interaction nerf; however, it’s 1AM over here and so I will continue tomorrow.

Great write-up. The consensus seems to be that IP is too good for an adept trait but this approach doesn’t seem to be a great way to nerf it. I’m not sure what the solution is.

It’s a well deserved change IMO.
I would have moved it to Grandmaster, just like necros.
Be happy they don’t nerf the duration in tourny, just like necros.

And it’s not like Engi doesn’t have enough access to burning already.
Or friggin passive-random-spam-rewarding procs, for that matter…coughnewtransmutecough (<—this one worries me)

The speedy kits change is just as much justified: we’ve been complaining so much about perma-evade that it would be unfair to complain about a vigor uptime nerf. You’ll still be able to get 66%+ uptime anyway.
And you don’t need to spam kits anymore while roaming around. My mouse is happy.

One incoming condi every 15 is a bit like Guardian Purity, I wouldn’t call it OP, in a real fight you -may- see the whiffing of clutch fears just like with a Bunk Guard. Unlike a Bunk Guard, Engi in general have very little Condi removal ability and this may slightly alleviate the problem.

IP has been a centrepiece in Engi DPS, now even Enhance Performance P/P builds will be knocked out of favour and what will be left is the meta Bomb/Nade. While that is the most viable setup for now, the only thing moving IP will achieve is reduced build diversity and strength.

I don’t know what they’d do with the Adept traits in Explosives now, but I don’t remember anything else out of the remaining 5, probably only Forceful Explosives.

MonMalthias.4763:

If Incendiary Powder were instead nerfed to:

• “For the next 2 seconds after activating a Toolbelt skill, your next critical hit has a 100% chance to cause Burning for 4 seconds (Cooldown 15 seconds)

Uhm.

garethh.3518:

MonMalthias.4763:

If Incendiary Powder were instead nerfed to:

• “For the next 2 seconds after activating a Toolbelt skill, your next critical hit has a 100% chance to cause Burning for 4 seconds (Cooldown 15 seconds)

Uhm.

Your suggestion

hide spoiler

It is already hell to watch all the animations and keep track of the skills in this game.
Adding another skill that requires staring at the opponents buff bar to counter… that is just largely counter productive.
No one will ever counterplay that.

my suggestion

hide spoiler

Traits shouldn’t be effects that need constant watching in the game, but instead just emphasize things that already exist.
Things like… ‘reduced CD if you have 3 toolbelt skills on CD’, or ‘if you use an ability’ or ‘if you use a toolbelt skill’.

That’d create more of a risk/reward playstyle, if you burn skills you get more back faster, but the enemy will see you burning your CDs so have an idea of how/when your vulnerable.

Honestly, what I’d do if I were Anet… I’d cut back the trait tree so hard, I’d just make 1 traitline with 5-6 slots and you pick an ability from a certain list for each slot.
It’d really narrow down the class, that is good, it’d make most engineers build around the same core mechanic, say that central sort of trait is ‘more skills on CD, the faster they recharge’. You can build an engi to MANY different ends around that core mechanic, it’d create dynamic gameplay and people watching will always have a decent idea of how your spec works. That’s an improvement in next to every aspect by doing less work.

Anyways, idk.
Anet seems to like to do their own thing

If the use a certain skill procs the burning then people will learn to look out for those particular skills not necessarily the buff bar.

Great ideas MonMalthias, as always you never fail to analyze and break things down appropriately.

Dirame.8521:

If the use a certain skill procs the burning then people will learn to look out for those particular skills not necessarily the buff bar.

It’s a trait, there is no guarantee the person took it so has that effect after the skill.. well I mean, short of staring at their buff bar.

And even if every engi took it so you knew the guy had it, it adds ANOTHER thing to watch out for on a class with 16+ skills, in a game with terrible animations and horrendous particle effects.

In ever way that is just compounding issues.
If the game wasn’t clusterfuzed with shoddy ‘solutions’ like this… this would be fine, the concept is fine, a burning proc after a certain action is a workable addition to gameplay… but that is so far from GW2 it’s not even funny.

The inced power nerf isn’t insanely bad, it is mostly the speedy kits nerf. While in sPvP it wont be as big of a hit, in WvW its going to be a HUGE nerf to our combat potential in zergs and roaming against other classes.

I agree with the OS post 100%. Moving IP into the master trait does absolutely nothing to the current nade/bomb build and actually lowers the amount of viable builds by limited the number of available conditions. I run P/SH with TK/FT/SS and sometimes i sub out the FT for Mines or some other utility and without that IP trait it makes these builds non-viable because you cant keep up enough condi pressure on the target.

Hmm but I guess we’ll just give a buff to Mesmers since they need it so bad. Mooooarr Dazes!

How about focusing on the existing problems with engis.

1) Magnet – Pull is bugged and target desyncs the majority of the pulls

2) Throw Mine – Increase range to 1200 ( This will make boon stripping engis viable for larger scale fights and put them up to par with necros in group fights.)

3) Mine field – Give a standard formation of the mines. RNG roll makes for unreliable skill.

4) Smoke Vent (FT) – How about a smoke field being generated by this similar to thieves. One would assume a FT venting its smoke would produce a larger smoke field than a pistol shooting black powder.. This skill is also unreliable as the radius is so short and with a 20sec CD spamming it like on other classes is hardly a problem.

5) Slick Shoes – How about giving stability to either this or the stunbreaker on the F1 skill? It’s fine for warriors to be able to have multiple sources of stability with their stunbreakers and at the same time put out more condi pressure at 3300+ armor with easy access to condi clears. One of the reasons why engis arent viable in larger battles is because of our access to stab relying on other classes for this its reliable and to use an elixer we sacrifice too much utility or mobility. Stunbreak and then stunned immediately after the break..

6) Mortar – The range on this definitely needs to be increased for a utility. If a Norn racial elite utility allows a class to smash across the map at 2k+ range a mortar should definitely be able to do similar distance. If you want some variety to what engis are running increase the range on this otherwise it will be every engi running the cookie cutter supply crate drop. Again increasing the viability for engis in group fights. For heavens sake its a MORTAR it should have some ridiculous range if this was a mortar being used on the field the operator would kill himself from shrapnel..

7) Pistol 1 – Bleed stacking is subpar to other condition based builds on other classes.
————

If you wanna remove IP so bad replace it with another trait based on CC instead of damage.
[Dry Ice] – Causes chill for 5 seconds on crit (10sec ICD).

Maul.3284:

[Dry Ice] – Causes chill for 5 seconds on crit (10sec ICD).

hahah .I always like to see reasonable sugestions.

mini.6018:

Maul.3284:

[Dry Ice] – Causes chill for 5 seconds on crit (10sec ICD).

hahah .I always like to see reasonable sugestions.

I laughed too.

I will reply only once to the feedback regarding my proposal; because then I’ll be moving on to Speedy Kits/Invigorating Speed.

garethh.3518:

Dirame.8521:

If the use a certain skill procs the burning then people will learn to look out for those particular skills not necessarily the buff bar.

garethh.3518:

It’s a trait, there is no guarantee the person took it so has that effect after the skill.. well I mean, short of staring at their buff bar.

And even if every engi took it so you knew the guy had it, it adds ANOTHER thing to watch out for on a class with 16+ skills, in a game with terrible animations and horrendous particle effects.

In ever way that is just compounding issues.
If the game wasn’t clusterfuzed with shoddy ‘solutions’ like this… this would be fine, the concept is fine, a burning proc after a certain action is a workable addition to gameplay… but that is so far from GW2 it’s not even funny.

Traits shouldn’t be effects that need constant watching in the game, but instead just emphasize things that already exist.
exc.
exc.

Things like… ‘reduced CD if you have 3 toolbelt skills on CD’, or ‘if you use an ability’ or ‘if you use a toolbelt skill’.

That’d create more of a risk/reward playstyle, if you burn skills you get more back faster, but the enemy will see you burning your CDs so have an idea of how/when your vulnerable.

I will say this: I agree with your assessment that the game is already busy enough with particle effects but your reply kind of says to me that you missed the “after using a toolbelt skill” trigger.

MonMalthias.4763:

If Incendiary Powder were instead nerfed to:

• “For the next 2 seconds after activating a Toolbelt skill, your next critical hit has a 100% chance to cause Burning for 4 seconds (Cooldown 15 seconds)

That being said, one can also rework Engineer traits to focus around Fields and Finishers, given that as a class we can pack the most Blast Finishers build for build as per a modified proposal of Dirame’s:

Dirame.8521:

Explosive Powder; Merge with Shrapnel. Explosions deal 10% more damage. Successful blast finishes cause 3 stacks of Bleeding and burning.

• Incendiary Powder: Successful Blast Finishers cause your next attack to inflict Burning for 4 seconds. ICD 10 seconds.

Now; onto the nerf to Vigour uptime for Engineers as addressed by the following change:

• Tools VI – Speedy Kits. Increased Swiftness duration to 10s. This effect can now only trigger once every 10 seconds.
  In case it wasn’t clear, the above change addresses the interaction between this trait, and Invigorating Speed

• When you gain swiftness, you also gain 5 seconds of vigor. (ICD 5seconds)
• This change effectively reduces Vigor uptime through Kit swapping for Engineers to 50%.
• That being said, it is still entirely possible for Engineers to have 100% Vigour uptime through another trait: Infused Precision
• You have a 50% chance to gain 5 seconds of Swiftness on critical hits. (Cooldown 5seconds)
• The only difference here is a Precision/Crit chance requirement of >30% (easily achievable by most builds) and the requirement of being in combat to receive the Swiftness.

Onto quotes:

welp no more permanent vigor. i’m sad

Vajra.3914:

Shigh, now boon stealing will be even more powerful since the duration of swiftness is increased…

DesertRose.2031:

With the buff to Modified Ammunition and the nerf to Speedy Kits 25+/30 will properly become the new meta.

Maderas.9741:

These changes seem kind of underwhelming from a PvP standpoint, minus the Vigor nerf which is pretty significant.

Terrahero.9358:

The nerf to Speedy Kits, because it is kitten well a nerf, also hurts a lot. We lose out on perma-vigor which was really a big deal to help stay alive. Guess ill just drop those 10 points and put em elsewhere.

DesertRose.2031:

For noobs like me Firearms would offer the highest amount of Vigor uptime because Speedy Kits will only enable to to keep up Vigor ~55% of the time.

Phineas Poe.3018:

At least we still have Infused Precision for perma Vigor.

kangaroosteak.6201:

Being tunneled into using infused precision to sub speedy kits instead of a standard SD firearms trait does not sound like much build diversity to me.

Adamantium.3682:

Try to run without permanent vigor for awhile. I opted out of that trait just to try a build awhile ago and you really don’t need it. If you’re timing the dodges to avoid the most important incoming attacks you should be fine.

Obviously the more you can dodge the better, but even with perma vigor you’re very likely not dodging to the fullest potential of 1 dodge every 5 seconds. I think most people would be surprised how little they actually gain out of perma vigor if they tried to play awhile without it. I know I was.

DesertRose.2031:

Phineas Poe.3018:

Not saying it’s supposed to satisfy their claim, but we still have permanent Vigor. In many cases Infused Precision is actually the better trait.

Infused Precision is only better if you have not a single kit equipped.
Speedy Kits gives you Swiftness also out of combat (very good in open PvE), you can be certain to have Swiftness and Vigor permanently (Infused Precision has only a 50% chance on crit to grant Swiftness, with few points in Alchemy you almost certainly have short down times), and it gives you Vigor exactly when you need it (swap kits during a dodge roll, then you hardly lose an auto attack).

Singer.8740:

Also why are you guys upset the only tings they have done to us that you can think of negative is force us to stop relying on Speedy Kits for vigor. It was a major crutch and i am glad they changed it, also do not forget this is a blanket nerf to all classes with endurance restoration ability’s so the playing field remains equal. (oh wait we can still perma vigor with infused precision and we all know that firearm builds are gonna be a hella popular come this patch.)

coglin.1867:

I am not going to name names, but I see two posters here who complained and moaned about having to swap in and out of kits every 5 seconds and practically demanding they extend its duration now complaining about it.

Dasboba.1652:

This is never about build diversity as anet puts it. It’s always about build shifting as opposed to diversity. (…)Thankfully, looking at the notes, my engy only gets the vigor nerf.

Xaylin.1860:

Perma Vigor is awesome and untill now insanely easy to achieve on Engineers. I use it, too, but I get why ANet doesn’t want it. Engineers still got many different ways to get a huge amount of Vigor and it doesn’t feel right that this was an almost mandatory trait for EVERY Engineer build. So this indeed is about build diversity although it is done in a negative way. (…) I’m having a hard time understanding all the commotion regarding the Speedy Kits change. You can get Swiftness from other sources to gain Vigor.

Nix.3152:

Jon, nerfing permavigor seems strange because engis are really easy to focus down. We are forced to bring kits in order to be effective. we cant bring 3 defence utis like other classes. most of the time engi has only 1 slot for stunbreak.

• The above quote is in reply to this post by JonPeters:

JonPeters.5630:

Invogorating Speed (sic)
The indirect nerf to this through speedy kits will reduce some surviveability in the alchemy line, but we felt like it was important given how much other strong stuff that line has.

NevirSayDie.6235:

Suggestions:

—Make speedy kits give X seconds of swiftness automatically every X seconds. That will satisfy people who dislike having to button mash just to get around. You can adjust vigor cooldowns however you want—you don’t have to tie that to speedy kits.

cottage.3274:

as for perma vigor its still will be doable but to take something you actively did and make it into a passive =boring that is if you feel the need to have perma vigor.

• This is in reference to the possibility of Engineers still having perma vigour through the Infused Precision / Invigorating Speed Interaction

Deified.7520:

Now I understand why you’re nerfing speedy kits, however you need to give us something in return. Dodging was our main damage negator. Without it engineer will be a lot harder to play. Don’t get me wrong, we have a few defensive skills. Toolkit, shield (woot this weapon will be required even more now), and elixir S. (…)
I think if you take care of one messed up mechanic (the infinte vigor which is very bad thing to have), take care of them all. (…)
You either need to significantly buff toolbelt skills are these skills or buff default weapon stats. Till you do that the meta will also involve primarily kits.

• There is some dissent amongst the Engineer community that despite the overall nerfs to Vigour uptime, Mesmer and Guardian still seem to have theirs untouched through their 5 point minors Critical Infusion and Vigorous Precision

Malhavoc Adhamar.3675:

So you want to nerf perma vigor, so you nerf this trait instead…would rather have seen a 10sec CD on IS (Invigorating Speed) rather than this.

BoB.6082:

The vigor nerf will destroy us in team fights. In team fights we don’t have fail safes for getting caught. Once we get caught were done. We also don’t have stability to make up for not having vigor.

Terrahero.9358:

Here’s the dirty truth. To be effective as an Engineer and deal damage you need to get pretty close to your opponent. Simply because of how the profession is designed and how every weapon or kit seems to scream at us “GET CLOSER!”.
Yet Engineer lacks the defenses to actually stay in close range. No series of evades, like ranger/thief. No stealth, like a thief. Not all that many blinds.
No solid healthpool like Warrior/Necro. No heavy armor, like Guardian/Warrior.

Even with perma-vigor, which comes at the cost of 2 major traits and constant APM to keep it rolling, engineer is still rather squishy in close range.

Ostricheggs.3742:

Voramoz.6790:

Stop trying to fight the vigor NERF. It’s happening. 100% swiftness is a lot already 100% vigor is in need of a NERF.

Yes it is. But it’s in need of a nerf across the board and not just targeted at engineers who are one of the least in need of such a nerf and its a nerf that hits home pretty hard given the fact that our survivability has taken a hit every single patch outside of the last one.

There are a large number of good examples to give for classes that have viable builds with far more dodges than engis can get.

AGAIN, invigorating speed is TOO STRONG. But you’re ignoring the blatant offenders (rangers, acrobatics thieves, energy sigils)

zaragoz.6351:

Well, I’m not going to lie to me this feels like huge nerfs across a spectrum of our builds. I don’t know how it will all play out, but I feel like currently one of the only reasons we can run berserker builds and be effective is because of the permanent vigor+speedy kits combination.
(…)
Now once it is changed, I have a feeling we’re going to be a lot worse off. I feel like on my full gc build that is where at least 50% of my survivability comes from.

December.3946:

The nerf to Invigorating Speed will greatly reduce our survivability when we fight on point. Other classes (Mesmers and Guardians) only need to invest measly 5 points to have perma vigor. Engineers, however, need to invest 20! Infused Precision grants SWIFTNESS not vigor. That means if we want to keep out-of-combat swiftness and vigor, we would actually need to give up either Grendier or Automated Response.
We all know Guardians and Mesmers have great survivability. Engineers need to actively dodge CC. I hope Anet will compensate this HUGE nerf to Engineers.

Aberrant.6749:

Lowering eng vigor and moving IP would be lowering damage and survival at the same time… burning the candle at both ends.

Lupanic.6502:

If you have to nerf our vigor (btw a ranger/thief are able to evade 3 times as much as we do in the same time) merge the traits to one trait.

Tools VI – Speedy Kits. Increased Swiftness duration to 10s. This effect can now only trigger once every 10 seconds.

should give 10 swftness and 5sec of vigor at the same time. So we do not have to spend 20points for something like this.

Cero.5132:

So technically… Putting 10 points into tools and 10 points into alchemy will give us 50% vigor uptime and 10s swiftness over a timeframe of 10s (boonduration not included).
With 2x rune of the monk and 2x rune of water and 30 in alchemy we can push it to 7.5 seconds of vigor every 10 seconds in pvp and 15 seconds of swiftness.
Only thing we have to do for this is change kits. Seeing that latey most engineers use at least 2 kits I guess we swap pretty regularly in a fight. So the active play to get these boons is minimal.

Now looking at a trait that gives automatically 50% endurance regeneration – Adrenal Implant.
It´s an investment of 30 points into tools. The trait itself doesnt need swiftness to trigger it. In fact it works completely passive. Though I think that most engineers would still take Speedy Kits if they´d go for it.
So there´s max 15s of swiftness and always 50% endurance regeneration without the possibility to enhance it. All that for 30! points into tools. The trait is a little bit more useful for engineers that use only 1 kit and thus mostly dont swap as regularly.

In my opinion Adrenal Implant as a grandmaster trait is overall still inferior to the Speedy kits/Invigorating Speed combo. I don´t think it should be moved down to master tier but instead it should get an additional effect. Nothing big just a minor tweak so that people actually consider taking it.

Summary

• General community consensus is on board with this change, possibly mollified by across-the-board nerfs to Vigor uptime, indicative of a good, strong first step towards limiting evasion spam

• Some dissent persists regarding the persistence of Mesmer’s Critical Infusion and Guardian’s Vigorous Precision as 5point minors that grant 100% Vigour uptime in combat.

• Some dissent centres around the possibility of 100% Vigour uptime persisting through Infused Precision which has sparked some discussion about the nerf being more about “build shifting” rather than real change

• Some dissent around the actual power level of a Vigour proc through a Swiftness proc requiring a 20 point investment and 2 Major Trait slots

• Others call for the Invigorating Speed trait itself to be nerfed to decrease Vigour uptime that way as it addresses the core issue instead of nerfing Kits in particular

• Leaving open the Infused Precision ‘loophole’ may very well make more builds to take points in Firearms, but this reduces Engineer mobility by reducing Swiftness uptime outside of combat instead and weakens the roaming Engineer role

engineer needs some mobility weakness atm. ALl engis do right now is run away dodge roll nade spam in an aoe so they barely miss you, they continue kiting and nade spamming until u die as the healing turret burst is so strong they can survive 1v1 like this for a long kitten time.

This change is a good one, more skill to do well with this class.

What follows is my opinion, and my opinion only. I will give it in bullet points in an effort to remain concise and to the point

• The first instance of a top level Engineer running the Speedy Kits / Invigorating Speed combination that also streamed was Teldo (again) in his Node Fighter build. Prior to that point, there were forum posts on the Engineer class forum regarding the potential of Infused Precision in Flamethrower builds getting 100% Vigour uptime

• Since the end of 2012, it seems that practically every Engineer was running the Speedy Kits / Invigorating Speed combination in tPVP as i-frame uptime and Evasion became very important to survive the high lethality Burst meta

• Due to short uptime and easy reapplication, this trend continued up to the Condition-Burst meta post Dhuumfire patch, despite buffs to “Boon-hate”

• I think the change is overall a positive one despite being a nerf. Nerfing evasion will in turn allow future downscaling of Time-to-Kill and combat lethality to slow down the game and allow for more tactical decision making over “spam everything, hope enemy falls down” mentality that apex builds seem to favour

• That being said, the APM requirement of Speedy Kits / Invigorating Speed is marginalised again in favour of a passive crit-proc of Infused Precision. One wonders whether this trend should continue “dumbing down” a highly technical class

• I believe that if Vigour uptime is to be addressed over the whole class, Invigorating Speed is the trait to be addressed rather than Speedy Kits. Addressing the Swiftness → Vigour proc and changing its mechanics to "X Uptime on hit will allow for tighter constraints when adjusting balance

• Speedy Kits remains the best trait for Engineer Mobility, and Power Shoes / Infused Precision remain marginalised as a result; limiting Build diversity due to limited access to 100% Swiftness uptime outside of Kits.

• Future buffs should therefore centre around the Swiftness outside of combat and outside of kits for Engineer in order to address the marginalisation of Elixirs, Turrets and Gadgets

Peow peow.2189:

engineer needs some mobility weakness atm. ALl engis do right now is run away dodge roll nade spam in an aoe so they barely miss you, they continue kiting and nade spamming until u die as the healing turret burst is so strong they can survive 1v1 like this for a long kitten time.

This change is a good one, more skill to do well with this class.

• If you have read the thread then you will have realised that Engineer as a class actually lacks mobility outside of Kits; and that Swiftness uptime was never the issue at hand, but Vigour uptime through the Invigorating Speed / Speedy Kits interaction

• Most of the Engineer community is in line with the change, including me. That being said, “Skill” has nothing to do with it. Kit switching on a 5 second tempo was already baseline as an entry level requirement for Engineer. One could even argue that reducing the 5 second tempo to 10 seconds decreases skill; also borne out by crit-proc nature of the Infused Precision trait.

• Stability uptime and Stunbreaks for Engineer as a class is still lacking. If you are getting kited by an Engineer, I suggest bringing Immobilise or CC; as with any other ‘slippery’ class. In addition to that, you can expect the ‘dodge roll spam’ to take a 50% hit come December 10.

• I will agree with the assessment that Engineer is very much “AOE Spammy” but this is not the topic of discussion here.

Prelude.3817:

It’s a well deserved change IMO.
I would have moved it to Grandmaster, just like necros.
Be happy they don’t nerf the duration in tourny, just like necros.

What a misguided post.

Dhuumfire is far more powerful for Necro’s then IP is for Engineers.

Why? Because Dhuumfire adds Burning to necro’s they otherwise would not have. Picking Dhuumfire directly boosts your damage-per-second.

Engineers already have good access to burns. Even without IP i could keep burn up 100% of the time bar condition cleanse. More burn doesnt add more damage-per-second. More burn will not make me drop someone faster, unlike a Necro.

The comparison with Dhuumfire is completely void. It would only apply if IP instead gave something like 6x-Bleed, or Torment, something that actually boosted my DPS.

I am glad that there has been no hiding the fact the bomb/nade build currently is,..what was the word they used..“Monstrous.”

Hebee.8460:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Dec-10th-Balance-Preview/first#post3133104

By increasing the swiftness duration on Speedy Kits, we hope to allow Swiftness to be maintained more reasonably without having to constantly be swapping between Kits.

Typical anet nerf. No one cares about constantly be swapping between Kits, but they bring such a HUGE nerf to this just to make the class more accessable to beginners. Swapping kits is the major requirement of playing an engi and whoever is willing to do so in combat(which keeps beeing a must) wont have any problems swapping them outside of combat as well.

Hebee.8460:

This change will also bring down the total up time for Vigor due to its interaction with Invigorating Speed. We don’t like classes having permanent Vigor, and this is one of the areas we needed to tone down the up time of the engineer’s Vigor.

Another obscure reason for this nerf: We dont like it!

Maybe anet should play their own game from time to time to recognize that we barely need perma vigor for survivability if the dont give us something in return. Reasons for this have been mentioned here enough, so i wont repeat them.

My next series of posts will concentrate on the changes to Exploit Weakness

• Explosives VI – Exploit Weakness. Increased the health threshold from 25% to 50%

• Intended utility of this trait is as anti-kiting mechanism for Engineers to help “finish off” a wounded target

• Trait likely buffed as “compensation” for moving Incendiary Powder up to Master tier.

Onto quotes:

JonPeters.5630:

One more thing I forgot to mention. The nice thing about Incendiary Powder was that it was a nice build neutral go to for adept tier. Right now the new build neutral traits there are Exploit Weakness and Empowering Adrenaline. I think a good discussion might be why these are not up to par as build neutral adept tier explosives traits.

dragonkain.3984:

Accelerant packed turrets and exploit weakness=both useless, turrets explosion is a measly 120 range which is lower than melle 130 range(rofl) and exploit weakness is a friggin cripple for 5 sec on a single target with 15 icd xD same with aegis, it’s just -1 hit, which is bleh.

Ostricheggs.3742:

Exploit weakness is underwhelming in the sense that you don’t really gain any utility and its tied to a health threshhold…

Banumiel.1926:

Engi is the class with minor DPS, so we are looking for sources of damage. Exploit weakness not deals damage and Empowering Adrenaline is a laughable damage because all the competitive builds are conditions builds, not power.

Engi problems:
-Rifle is meh, SD is funny for hot joins, but power builds are not viable seriously
-Turrets are a joke (except Healing Turret)
-Gadgets are a joke (except Rocket Boots)

Yeah, my english is lamentable, sorry

Deified.7520:

Exploit weakness mostly because of the conditions that need to be met, the cooldown, and then what it actually does. So many class have gap makers/closers that aren’t affected by cripple. Leaps, teleports, etc. Then you have condi cleansing which some classes can do great while others can’t. I mean your sacrificing a trait slot for something that applies a small 5s cripple and only when the player reaches 25% hp. Perhaps exploring using with vunlerability, torment, confusion, or something else that would fit the whole exploit weakness vibe.

Ahlen.7591:

Because they’re both inconsistent and terrible? And completely useless in PVE. Exploit Weakness might be ok if it was 50% instead of 25%, with a 10s ICD in PVP.

Maskaganda.2043:

going extra 10 in explosives without bombs/nades isn’t much worth it although the change to exploit weakness might be decent enough to go 20 for both e.w. and i.p. (Exploit Weakness and Incendiary Powder)

Malhavoc Adhamar.3675:

Explosives VI – Exploit Weakness. Increased the health threshold from 25% to 50%

Nice but not really a decent trade for IP being moved to Master tier

Luthan.5236:

I like the changes on elixir infused bombs and the “Exploit Weakness” traits. Not using bombs a lot atm but I might try with that trait again. Also might try “Exploit Weakness” – I usually stayed with my rifle and using Sitting Duck atm. Might be nice against single targets and in smaller scaled group fights.

Cyanide.7952:

What if exploit weakness gave an extra 1% damage boost per stack of vulnerability?

Dirame.8521:

Exploit Weakness; Not taken because cripple doesn’t = damage. Since this trait is going to set to proc at 50% instead of 25% I think it will have it’s merits but I feel it only viable in builds that don’t have space for it. Empowering Adrenaline is okay in my opinion. Probably wasn’t taken because the benefit isn’t all that huge.

Deacon.9725:

Exploit Weakness_ – excellent change to health threshold as it makes this trait meaningfully synergistic with a Firearms-heavy build (ie, Modified Ammunition).

hackks.3687:

I understand the move of IP to Master tier, but as it has been pointed out the Master tier in Explosives has a glut of the better traits in the line. So with that being said, how about giving us something at the adept level that shares synergy with IP as well as some new utility or damage sources?

For example:

Exploit Weakness – deal extra damage to Burning foes (20% ?)

mammasaura.5907:

About Exploit Weakness:

This adept trait can be compared with Sitting duck from the Firearms tree.
Sitting duck got a nice rework giving two conditions, but mainly rifle stuff.
Explosives are supposed to help any weapon set and any kit, then Exploit Weakness seems to be a cc trait, if Sitting duck, adept trait, got two conditions maybe also Exploit Weakness can.

Exploit Weakness: double threshold, at 50% and 25%, shared internal cd, conditions mutual exclusive:
#at 50%: cripple;
#at 25%: immobilyze.

• it’s in the context, if you’re weak, I cc you better:
• for both power and condition build;
• it avoids to the burst build both the conditions;
• durable fights are better rewarded.

Kamahl.3621:

(Continued from last post)
For Exploit Weakness, to coincide with the ‘Make mainhand weapons better’ schema from earlier, perhaps recharge your normal weapons’ cooldowns upon making an enemy hit 25% health, kitten cooldown? I’m really just trying to push for other things being viable than facerolling with grenades / bombs, waiting for an enemy to mess up, then blowing your burst on them and hoping it downed them, as that is how most PvP encounters go when you’re not bunkering.

pheroth.5306:

Exploit Weakness – You could say this has a more impactful effect compared to the previous trait but honestly I find this useless because you can usually use other engineer skills most of the time to accomplish that same thing.

Mork vom Ork.2598:

Exploit Weakness – limited use in sPvP, very limited use in WvWvW, completely useless in PvE (…)
This sums up to: for any build other than a bomb bunker spending only 10 points in Explosives is not desirable.

I believe Ayestes and Lord Banon’s posts sum up why Exploit Weakness is considered unworthy

Ayestes.1273:

I’ll probably be taking Shrapnel or Exploit Weakness now with my HGH build, but I will admit they feel lackluster. After thinking about it I’ll probably focus on Shrapnel now, but there was a pretty good reason these weren’t considered above Incendiary Powder.

Exploit Weakness’ problem was two-fold and one of those is solved. 25% meant they were probably already dead, so raising it to 50% helps. The other problem is it’s only a Cripple. Given Glue Shot, Chill Nades, and maybe Glue Bomb if I’m going a little wonky (again, in my HGH builds) I already have the slow affect on someone when I need it, although I’d admit all of these are difficult to land at long range. If I’m engaging someone down to 50% though, they are probably in mid range where my damage is effective and I’ve already got them under some control. It’s obviously got it’s uses, but for the value of a trait slot a mere Cripple doesn’t seem like enough. I haven’t experimented enough with it though, maybe it’ll shine a bit more now that I have some chance to use it. I’d rather it be a significant effect with a decent cooldown though to start considering it above Shrapnel.

LordBanon.6803:

Explosives VI – Exploit Weakness. Increased the health threshold. 25% to 50%
This change makes it minimally viable, but it still seems like a weak trait. Given the broad access Engies have to immobilize/chill/cripple effects already. If you care about cripple, you probably already have it in your skill selection, and the additional 33% uptime cripple that requires getting the opponent down to 50% seems marginal.

Summary

• General consensus amongst the Engineer community seems to be that this buff as “compensation” for Incendiary Powder moving to Master is insignificant

• As a general rule, Engineer is most dangerous to fight within mid range – that is between 130 units (outside melee) to 600 (where skillshots reliably connect). Whilst Cripple may seem useful at first for this context, the fact of the matter is that people running a CC build already have ample sources of Cripple and Immobilize through Sitting Duck ; Glue Bomb ; Glue Shot ; Net Shot ; Net Turret ; Net Attack ; Box of Nails ; Elixir F ; and finally Launch PBR . One more Cripple in the kitten nal at a long, 15sec cooldown isn’t going to cut it

• There seems to be a sentiment that whilst buffing the threshold at which Exploit Weakness triggered would seem to be useful at first glance, the addition of Cripple to a low target does not kill it any faster

• General sentiment seems to be either merging Exploit Weakness’s utility with something else ; or reworking the “% health” trigger to do something that actually increases damage ; such as inflicting Vulnerability

What follows is my opinion, and my opinion only. I will give it in bullet points in an effort to remain concise and to the point

• Exploit Weakness applies Cripple to enemies at a “% health” threshold, where other professions have increased damage instead.

• For a class that is rife with snares and immobilises, one more Cripple just doesn’t cut it.

• Engineer as a class has lacking Main Hand Weapons, which is why Kits have figured large in every single tPVP build since Beta Weekend ; save Pistol / Pistol HGH before Explosive Shot and Coated Bullets was nerfed into the ground

• For a class that is known for “Hybrid” DPS ; that is, combination of both Condition and Direct Damage ; there are few traits and skills that take advantage of this save for ; Target the Maimed and Flame Jet and with the Dhuumfire patch ; Modified Ammunition .

• Exploit Weakness may therefore become more viable if the “Hybrid DPS” line of thought was expanded:

Exploit Weakness: – Deal 5% more damage to Immobilized, Crippled or Chilled foes. Foes under 25% health are inflicted with 5 Stacks of Vulnerability for 10 seconds if inflicted with a movement impairing condition (Cripple, Chill, Immobilize) (Cooldown 10 seconds)

• With an abundance of Cripples in the kitten nal of the Engineer, new builds may yet arise to the forefront of viability; say; Flamethrower with Elixir Gun; or we may finally see some Engineers run Sigil of Hydromancy or Ice or Runes of Grenth.

• An alternative to be explored is once again with Dirame’s proposals to load up more utility into Combo Finishers through traits. In this vein:

Exploit Weakness: – Successful Blast Finishers in a combo Field also inflict 5 seconds of Cripple on foes (15 seconds Cooldown). Deal 5% more damage to Crippled foes

MonMalthias.4763:

I will say this: I agree with your assessment that the game is already busy enough with particle effects but your reply kind of says to me that you missed the “after using a toolbelt skill” trigger.

That being said, one can also rework Engineer traits to focus around Fields and Finishers,

And?
If you want to counterplay it?

It seems like you’re trying to make the skill more engaging, I like the effort.
But just know that those added proc ideas are, individually, fine ideas they add a bit to gameplay and more is more, but in GW2… they are hurting the game something terrible. It’s piling complexity and a little depth onto a system drowning in complexity (with little to no depth).

Anyways.
What I’m saying won’t fix the game in a day but is pretty necessary for GW2 to have PvP’ers in a year.

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

I am glad that there has been no hiding the fact the bomb/nade build currently is,..what was the word they used..“Monstrous.”

it is very strong indeed i wouldn’t call it “Monstrous” or op but viable.
the thing is it`s one of 2 (3 if you run power build) ng meta builds and everything in the meta basically can counter it atm weak to range dps (ranger) weak to condi (necro) weak to cc (warrior) and s/d thiefs can also gib it in team fights if played well.
so given this it`s a well balanced build.
but no worry hgh will be making a strong comeback after the 10th.
let the qq train begin