Guild Wars 2

Right now turret engineers are the easiest spec to play in the game, and yet one of the most effective.

Against an ORGANIZED team, this spec isn’t that great. The reality though is that all hot join, all solo queue, and >50% of team queue is not against organized teams (even team queue are mostly pug except at the very high end). The spec is way too effective given the difficulty in playing it. It needs a nerf. A few options:

The easy fix:
—Decrease damage inflicted by all turrets by 50%

The better fix:
Make turrets more of a support function (think banner warrior). They each play a role, but shouldn’t be the main focus of a spec.
—Remove all offensive capabilities of the turrets
—Have turrets give buffs by default (no more trait needed)

Yup, this build is absurdly easy to play & way too rewarding for the amount of effort involved. I’ve seen turret engies 1v2 other new players in hotjoin simply by dropping all turrets/crate and run around random dodging. This cannot be good for the game.

Now that turrets have a trait which allows them to give boons, the damage should be nerfed and they should have more of a support based role.

last I heard they’re buffing turret engis. Currently the overcharge on rocket turret has a really short “effective” range. That’ll get changed to where they’re getting even more CC at even longer ranges!

But I could be wrong, I didnt watch that ready up. Just what I heard!

You’re right ostrich, they get more CC. Because the 3 second almost instant cast launch on a 15 second recharge by just having a rifle wasn’t enough

BlazinFyre.2410:

You’re right ostrich, they get more CC. Because the 3 second almost instant cast launch on a 15 second recharge by just having a rifle wasn’t enough

To be perfectly frank I’ve never actually seen a turret engi play his spec to the fullest. It’s depressing, really. There have been so many times where I could have been stuck locked to death and the turret engis just flubs and keeps hipshotting.

a t s e.9614:

You have to let bads enjoy the game too. If they nerf turrets we will lose 30% of our player base.

Well…sad but true

Removing the offense of the turret isn’t the answer. We don’t need another Spirit Ranger running around, do we?

Personally I’d tone down the turret damage with their auto attacks and buff the performance of the turret active abilities. Turrets should provide enough sustain to keep the enemy on the defensive while on point but not be enough to rip someone’s health down as quickly as they do. Improving the actives would make sure they provide the needed crowd control and small burst damage to punish people from being on point, as is their job, but would need input from the player to be effective.

You still thinks thats turret dmg what killing you?:-P Thats funny:-) FYI that turrets hits you for like 1k every 4s (I am sure this must be gamebreaking) or so what killing you is massive condi damage (because every good turret engi runs Rabid) and condi proces from non turret related traits runes and sigils. Nerf turrets dmg? Fine with me you will still die in same time:-)
Turret engi is so easy to counter OMFG so easy.. And its also so easy be some ranger who throw 20s in row all attacks into reflects and then cry how engi is OP while he kill himself by his own attacks..

please don’t nerf it anet, it’s much better than seeing grenade/tool kit/elixir S engies every game, so little variation!

So push a couple buttons to drop your kits then dodge around a bit = pvp skill. Really is a sad state of affairs.

Relentliss.2170:

So push a couple buttons to drop your kits then dodge around a bit = pvp skill. Really is a sad state of affairs.

Go and play engi first man.

But hey, engineers are the hardest class to play!

Rozbuska.5263:

Relentliss.2170:

So push a couple buttons to drop your kits then dodge around a bit = pvp skill. Really is a sad state of affairs.

Go and play engi first man.

I did, made and engi and started using it on skyhammer in soloq…the result? I was able to kill ppl pulling them on glass with magnet from stealth and won 3 out of 3 games in 150-200 soloq ladder with a total of 10 matches on engi (And maybe another 10 matches on first and second account)…i deleted the kittening engi right after the third win, i’d rather lose than playing that kitten since ladder has no point anyway and i don’t want to win exploiting maps, i can’t play engi..i would suck harder then someone could even imagine on other maps, but on skyhammer engi is so reterded you can actually be good even if you don’t even know kitten are you doing…so yeah go try engi on sh, if you think it’s stupid after you try it you’ll realize that is even more stupid than you think..

Zord.6130:

But hey, engineers are the hardest class to play!

They were…more than one year ago when only really good players like Teldo were able to be really effective on engi, then, hgh first and decap-clows right after, kicked in and now things are just getting worse at every patch..

Archaon.9524:

Rozbuska.5263:

Relentliss.2170:

So push a couple buttons to drop your kits then dodge around a bit = pvp skill. Really is a sad state of affairs.

Go and play engi first man.

I did, made and engi and started using it on skyhammer in soloq…the result? I was able to kill ppl pulling them on glass with magnet from stealth and won 3 out of 3 games in 150-200 soloq ladder with a total of 10 matches on engi (And maybe another 10 matches on first and second account)…i deleted the kittening engi right after the third win, i’d rather lose than playing that kitten since ladder has no point anyway and i don’t want to win exploiting maps, i can’t play engi..i would suck harder then someone could even imagine on other maps, but on skyhammer engi is so reterded you can actually be good even if you don’t even know kitten are you doing…so yeah go try engi on sh, if you think it’s stupid after you try it you’ll realize that is even more stupid than you think..

Play thief if you only want to pull people.

Zord.6130:

But hey, engineers are the hardest class to play!

A well played engi IS the hardest, most skill required class to play.

That doesn’t mean you can’t faceroll in some cheap build and stay alive.

Neah. Engineers will be more buffed soon. Why nerf them when they will be happier buffed?

Compared to the other “cheesy” builds (PU mesmer, evisc war, d/d celestial ele, ect.) that are out there now, ive seen maybe 1-2 turret engies per 100 of those other builds. Not that it isnt cheesy, but I must just be not getting into those games. Too bad, i’d rather face a mindless turret engy than a multi kit condi one that knows what he’s doing.

I think a rework of turrets so that their actives are meaningful and timed well-used activation of their active skills are necessary for success would be better than just nerfing them. Also conditions should affect them, even if it isn’t 100%.

In fact I think all true AI (read: not banners/spirits) need to have their damage and utility pushed heavily onto their actives. An AI build should have to interact with their summoned peons to have success, this means having to use their actives well, and doing things like using CC to set up the minion actives, or using the AI actives to set up for your own damage. Ex: shatter mesmers.

Also turrets aren’t getting buffed according to the preview. One turret had a QoL buff, akin to making minion AI not garbage, and they had their CC significantly nerfed.

Add a reliable non-conquest mode in pvp and you should be fine.

Sizer.5632:

Too bad, i’d rather face a mindless turret engy than a multi kit condi one that knows what he’s doing.

Exactly.

The amount of skill required to play turrets pales in comparison to a “multi-kit” condi engi… I’m not saying that turrets are better than condis. I think a turret build is completely useless in high level play

But the efficacy for the amount of player input required on the part of a turret spec is beyond out of whack. It’s been part of gw2’s problem forever, but there’s hardly a spec out there that’s a better example than a turret engi.

It’s been too many times when I’ve downed one of those kittens while he just spams hipshot and then proceed to die to his turrets mid stomp and lose the down fight…

So turret engineers are not that great. They should be buffed to make a challenge.

I’d love to hear from ANET why they thought buffing turret engi was a good idea.

Kibbles.9813:

Engineers are the only profession besides Banner Warriors in the game that are able to lay down their utility skills on a point, walk away from them and still have them be effective to some degree, with the addition that the turrets also passively deal damage. A Turret Engineer doesn’t even have to be on or anywhere near a point to put pressure on a capture attempt.

Summoning three AI minions that follow the player and deal damage are one thing, but self repairing AI objects that do not despawn when the player leaves their radius, self-repair and have no penalty for actually being destroyed is another thing entirely.

I am curious, do you find leaving your 3 utilities (not to mention healing turret) somewhere that they do not directly benefit you advantageous? I don’t.

Just putting this out there cause you make it sound as if turret engineers do this regularly.

style.6173:

I’d love to hear from ANET why they thought buffing turret engi was a good idea.

I think that their philosophy for Engineers are to buff them until they can do everything the other professions can do, only better.

Thanks.

style.6173:

I’d love to hear from ANET why they thought buffing turret engi was a good idea.

Before the turret buff the engi had a very bad gadgets, very bad turrets and hard nerfed elixirs and good kits. So they buffed turrets just to give the engi something beside kits.

I am fine if they remove the turrets or nerf them very hard but buff something else.

@Lupanic.6502: there are many spells and traits that are completely useless on some classes (sup thief traps): anet didn’t bother buffing/redesigning any of those to the point that they can carry most terrible players

lol @ people saying turrets do no dmg, rocket launcher alone hits for 3k.. how many dodges do you need to avoid rocket launcher AA alone…eh?

the issue with turrets is:
- they stay too long, it is not like thief guild or crate that you can wait out
- turrets don’t get destroyed when engis goes somewhere else… meaning he can defend point or support his teammates when he is not even there
- turrets have waaay too long range (longer than some classes) so literary only counters are either snipe them with meteor shower or go invul+ stabs and spam aoe (guards, wars)… all other classes don’t even need to try
- turrets are immune to crits, condis and CCs and are waaaaaayyyyyyyy too tanky, i think rocket launcher effectively has around 30k HP at least… you can at least blind/fear etc. ranger or necro pets, you can’t do same with turrets… if you play a class that relies on crits/condis/CC, you are in a losing fight

I think 2 things need to happen
- turrets should be affected by condis and crits at least in pvp
- if engi is too far from his turrets (walks to other point) his turrets get destroyed

I know engis will flame me and what not, but let’t face it it would be really broken if i could summon like 10 thieves that never disappear, would be immune to crits/condi/CC and stay on other points as i want them to.

Speaking of which, hey Anet devs, since you guys apprently (looking at the patches) think that army of AI is definition of fun~ and healthy~ pvp, why don’t you allow other classes like thieves, warriors etc. spawn armies of persistet pets and rename GW into Pokemon Wars? Let us all sit afk somewhere and watch our pets battles! I am sure this would be something you would be very proud of, just like Skyhammer!

P.S. almost forgot, the reflect on turrets was last thing this game needed :/

A thought occurred.

Turret engineers are about as useful in soloQs as bunker guardians are in teamQ. The opposite of that statement is almost laughable =L

pff, if you think that self repairing turrets are bad you have never seen self replicating turrets.

First off I have played turret engi since the day this game came out. I don’t usually play meta builds because well most of the time they are no fun. I also like to play builds I think should have been created just for the class ( turrets for engi, Minions for Necro, spirit weapons for guard and so on) I rate myself above average in skill and again I have played my turret engi since day one. I remember well over a year ago locking down points and having people call me cheesy for playing turrets in a conquest mode game (turret engi was way bad then). Since then there where some minor tweaks to the build and a huge surge of players started running turrets to counter Skyhammer. Then when these same folks started using this build in all matches everyone started to cry. Why you ask?? ( created a spread sheet the last 3 weeks to outline why I believe people hate the spec)

Reason one- 78.32% of all players I faced on point ran straight in and allowed my thumper turret punch them down.

Reason two- 69.99% of all players I faced ran on point and stood inside my turrets while flame turret and rocket turret just freely casted them to death.

Reason three- 64.92% of all players faced ran in and attempted to focus down my healing turret while taking damage from the other 3 turrets. once the healing turret was destroyed they where knocked back and kill shortly after.

Listen, These top 3 examples of players in TPvP arena’s fighting me is funny because these are good examples of what not to do when killing a turret engi.

Turret engi is designed to hold points and I do so very well. I always win the 1 on 1 matches against other turret engi’s, reason is because I don’t stand there and let my turrets auto attack. I use my tool belt skills and all combos available to turret engi. I also never leave my turrets I always pack them up and take them with me. People that die to the turret engi die because they make mistakes. The first one being the point is mine and you are not going to take it from me if you dive head first into my turrets and let me control the area. I have 1v2, 1v3, 1v4 players more then once because I play my turrets right!

Rozbuska.5263:

You still thinks thats turret dmg what killing you?:-P Thats funny:-) FYI that turrets hits you for like 1k every 4s (I am sure this must be gamebreaking) or so what killing you is massive condi damage (because every good turret engi runs Rabid) and condi proces from non turret related traits runes and sigils. Nerf turrets dmg? Fine with me you will still die in same time:-)
Turret engi is so easy to counter OMFG so easy.. And its also so easy be some ranger who throw 20s in row all attacks into reflects and then cry how engi is OP while he kill himself by his own attacks..

Very good points! Most of the guys that cry to me are exactly the examples above. lol

I’m not sure if this is a troll post since the description on how to fix the issue is basically to remove the entire point of turrets which is not a solution.

What I have seen in sPvP since general release is that people have issues with low risk, low skill, moderate reward builds. Regardless of hambow war, d/d ele, hgh engineer, or s/d thief or mm necro and turret engineer, they are all low skill cap builds that did well in PvP. There are nerfs coming to some turret stuff. I believe one was making the knockback not as far but I would have reread the ready ups.

Having played engineer since the beginning, this is only the SECOND complaint about engi’s after HGH and even then no one says it’s overpowered, only that it’s extremely annoying. Anyway, if you are going to complain about AI then complain about AI or complain about low risk, low skill builds and use this as an example but otherwise I doubt it will be much of an issue come the fall. Everyone will have brand new complaints and the meta will change as it has been for the last 2 years.

Thiefz.3695:

Having played engineer since the beginning, this is only the SECOND complaint about engi’s after HGH and even then no one says it’s overpowered, only that it’s extremely annoying.

I take it you missed the whole decap engi situation earlier this year.

That said, the AI is too strong. Turrets do need a major damage nerf. They should become more about supporting the engi build and not BE the entire engi build. There is a difference.

style.6173:

Thiefz.3695:

Having played engineer since the beginning, this is only the SECOND complaint about engi’s after HGH and even then no one says it’s overpowered, only that it’s extremely annoying.

I take it you missed the whole decap engi situation earlier this year.

That said, the AI is too strong. Turrets do need a major damage nerf. They should become more about supporting the engi build and not BE the entire engi build. There is a difference.

That’s a great point. Love my turret engi! Hate that turrets is the entire build.

style.6173:

That said, the AI is too strong. Turrets do need a major damage nerf. They should become more about supporting the engi build and not BE the entire engi build. There is a difference.

But such an engi build is all about turrets. How else it could be, when you spend two grandmaster traits and several other traits upon them? Specialization must pay off, else it would be a waste of points.
Also, unlike other classes, engineers have got a single weapon. And since we’re talking about a full turret build, there is no kit involved here.
It is a bit hard to advocate for active play when a class must spend most of its time by autoattacking to begin with.

How about turrets not working on their own, but the player activating their skills? This would make for more active and meaningful play on the turret engineers’ part. The engineer would have to manage his turrets, but in turn would gain more control over when, in which order they activate and whom to target. This would also make it meaningless leaving turrets on the point on their own, as it would require engineer to target for the turrets to actually react. Leave Supply Crate turrets as are.

But of course, this would never happen, as Anet haven’t ever really been fond of actuallly making faceroll builds more reactive.

The meaningful skills are already activated by the players – they’re called overcharges. For the rest of the time, turrets just offer some sustained damage.
How do you change how that works, considering that engineer design is mostly against burst damage? You can’t just pack all that sustained damage into a single skill and call it done. One could just ready multiple turrets and burst down an enemy by using all the skills together. Or use a kit and do the same with the remaining turrets.
Having low-to-medium cooldowns, in the order of 10~15 seconds, may lessen the problem explained above. But it wouldn’t change much from how it is now. Basically, even changing how they work, they would still end up having to do sustained damage.

I would also add that leaving turrets on a point is exactly the point of them being turrets. If the engineer moves to another point, the only thing will be able to do there is to use its weapon skills (not even the toolbelt ones, as you would have to destroy the turrets to properly use the turret toolbelt skills). It wouldn’t make sense for them not to work during that time, as the engineer is effectively weakened when he’s far from them.

I saw a turret placed floating in the air above the point in temple, is that a new buff?

Yasha.5963:

I saw a turret placed floating in the air above the point in temple, is that a new buff?

No its a terrible bug that happens all the time. I have been reporting this behavior for over a year in game. Sometimes this happens to me on Mine for one map and on windmill in Khilo. Not sure it it effects damage to or from the turret but happens to me most every night.

Manuhell.2759:

style.6173:

That said, the AI is too strong. Turrets do need a major damage nerf. They should become more about supporting the engi build and not BE the entire engi build. There is a difference.

But such an engi build is all about turrets. How else it could be, when you spend two grandmaster traits and several other traits upon them? Specialization must pay off, else it would be a waste of points.
Also, unlike other classes, engineers have got a single weapon. And since we’re talking about a full turret build, there is no kit involved here.
It is a bit hard to advocate for active play when a class must spend most of its time by autoattacking to begin with.

You missed my comment in the OP. I don’t think engis should have to spend a grandmaster trait on turrets. I think the boons should come automatically while at the same time the damage is removed.

Also, a lot of turret builds still use one kit.

Drafigo.4690:

First off I have played turret engi since the day this game came out. I don’t usually play meta builds because well most of the time they are no fun. I also like to play builds I think should have been created just for the class ( turrets for engi, Minions for Necro, spirit weapons for guard and so on) I rate myself above average in skill and again I have played my turret engi since day one. I remember well over a year ago locking down points and having people call me cheesy for playing turrets in a conquest mode game (turret engi was way bad then). Since then there where some minor tweaks to the build and a huge surge of players started running turrets to counter Skyhammer. Then when these same folks started using this build in all matches everyone started to cry. Why you ask?? ( created a spread sheet the last 3 weeks to outline why I believe people hate the spec)

Reason one- 78.32% of all players I faced on point ran straight in and allowed my thumper turret punch them down.

Reason two- 69.99% of all players I faced ran on point and stood inside my turrets while flame turret and rocket turret just freely casted them to death.

Reason three- 64.92% of all players faced ran in and attempted to focus down my healing turret while taking damage from the other 3 turrets. once the healing turret was destroyed they where knocked back and kill shortly after.

Listen, These top 3 examples of players in TPvP arena’s fighting me is funny because these are good examples of what not to do when killing a turret engi.

Turret engi is designed to hold points and I do so very well. I always win the 1 on 1 matches against other turret engi’s, reason is because I don’t stand there and let my turrets auto attack. I use my tool belt skills and all combos available to turret engi. I also never leave my turrets I always pack them up and take them with me. People that die to the turret engi die because they make mistakes. The first one being the point is mine and you are not going to take it from me if you dive head first into my turrets and let me control the area. I have 1v2, 1v3, 1v4 players more then once because I play my turrets right!

What are we supposed to do them? Run away and let you dominate the point uncontested the whole game.

AI builds are sooooo cool
this game definitely needs more of them
\sarcasmoff

style.6173:

You missed my comment in the OP. I don’t think engis should have to spend a grandmaster trait on turrets. I think the boons should come automatically while at the same time the damage is removed.

Well, right now, they do spend it, as the boons are an additional part.
And changing them like you say would make them useless, as they would end up being a poor man’s banners – no offensive functions, but while being destructible, not movable and giving strippable buffs. Could as well use a banner warrior then. At least you can use more banners and weapons that way.

style.6173:

Also, a lot of turret builds still use one kit.

And said kit will be mostly untraited, as most of the points are spent upon turrets. Using a kit also means you’ll have at most two offensive turrets out, apart from the occasional supply crate. It probably ends up being better than the 3 turrets solution just because of how terrible the main weapons are, anyway. Even if you waste a bit of efficency, trait wise.

Turret Engies are now called Home Depo’s thanks to Zeromis!

Turret engie is only good in hotjoin. OR if placed well in a very balanced team. Other then that they are not that good. Turret engie is only 33% effective with turret build, while a good roaming engie with kits can be more then that.

cortoss.8093:

Drafigo.4690:

First off I have played turret engi since the day this game came out. I don’t usually play meta builds because well most of the time they are no fun. I also like to play builds I think should have been created just for the class ( turrets for engi, Minions for Necro, spirit weapons for guard and so on) I rate myself above average in skill and again I have played my turret engi since day one. I remember well over a year ago locking down points and having people call me cheesy for playing turrets in a conquest mode game (turret engi was way bad then). Since then there where some minor tweaks to the build and a huge surge of players started running turrets to counter Skyhammer. Then when these same folks started using this build in all matches everyone started to cry. Why you ask?? ( created a spread sheet the last 3 weeks to outline why I believe people hate the spec)

Reason one- 78.32% of all players I faced on point ran straight in and allowed my thumper turret punch them down.

Reason two- 69.99% of all players I faced ran on point and stood inside my turrets while flame turret and rocket turret just freely casted them to death.

Reason three- 64.92% of all players faced ran in and attempted to focus down my healing turret while taking damage from the other 3 turrets. once the healing turret was destroyed they where knocked back and kill shortly after.

Listen, These top 3 examples of players in TPvP arena’s fighting me is funny because these are good examples of what not to do when killing a turret engi.

Turret engi is designed to hold points and I do so very well. I always win the 1 on 1 matches against other turret engi’s, reason is because I don’t stand there and let my turrets auto attack. I use my tool belt skills and all combos available to turret engi. I also never leave my turrets I always pack them up and take them with me. People that die to the turret engi die because they make mistakes. The first one being the point is mine and you are not going to take it from me if you dive head first into my turrets and let me control the area. I have 1v2, 1v3, 1v4 players more then once because I play my turrets right!

What are we supposed to do them? Run away and let you dominate the point uncontested the whole game.

Dominating a point is what a turret engi or any other bunker build does, thats their job! Every Bunker class has its weakness and every bunker class has its disadvantages. Good players know these. If you know the weakness of the turret engi you will dominate him. First off you have to out play the bunker class and be a better player. Trust me no bunker engi stands there and auto attacks. If so you should be able to out play him. If you are a high risk high damage class/build first off you have no business going solo against any bunker class especially the Turret engi! This is a team game, use your team to dominate points, Not the little ole Engi!

Turrets for Life!

Like a few have said, you can outplay someone who is just auto attacking with turrets.

Turret engies can be taken down in a few ways (trust me I know)

1, Mass AOE spread and cleave. Dont focus the engie, he can just CC chain you to death. Rid yourself of the turrets and hes next to useless if they are your ‘regular player’.

2, Use confusion, Im not 100% sure how well it scales but the turrets attacks do some damage to the engie, all be it I havent tested this to the max so dont quote me here tooooo much

3, Out rotate him pure and simple. If hes on a cap, let him stay there, hit the other nodes and be offensive. If he leaves his turrets hes even more useless in that fight and easilly killed. So many people just run into a cap with turrets on the node. Why? I dont know…

4, The reason people dislike the build when going up against it is its CC and decapping ability. This is being NERFED in this patch. The knockback is being reduced. This is needed imho, so that these players can actually improve. There are cookie cutter builds for most classes in this game and they are VERY useful for new players to gain confidence and to get them into the game.

No competitive teams high end in GW2 are using turrets to the max. Thats just the truth. Theres a reason for that. They can come into a team of course and be effective, but more than likely the opposite team will counter fast.

Engineer is having its turn for some discomfort in terms of rage. Hambow had it Minion Mancer had it Spirit Ranger had it. The AI helps, but how many times have you played against a casual spvper running one of those builds and have won? Some skill and knowledge of sPVP is still needed to be truely effective in a team.

You actually have to activate the skills to utilise the turrets efficiently, such as the thumper turret, YES it knocks back but more importantly it does gie you two blast finishers, planting some fire fields down will give him more might, but I rarely even see it, be glad that most dont use them to their full potential :P

Thanks

Jebro

P.S celestial Turret build op :P

a t s e.9614:

You have to let bads enjoy the game too. If they nerf turrets we will lose 30% of our player base.

QFT.

@jebro- don’t give away to much next time! I don’t want the players to figure us out! lol

Turrets for life!