Guild Wars 2

Hi guys.

Just here to pop my thought through on why I think the engineer is in just a shoddy place.
This is for PvP and WvW (small scale) only.
To be clear this is my opinion and I could be completely wrong.

1. Over-abundance of blind.

As Engineers we VERY rarely autoattack, they do pitiful damage, SLOW attack speed and generally are a waste. This makes blinds SUPER effective vs the engineer.
Its very clear that Mesmer(on shatter when traited, which is common in this meta) and Ele(when traited into fire) is able to completely beat us out due to these blinds.

2. Unblockable skills and engineer damage mitigation and opposed mitigation.

Many unblockable skills such as mirror blade(especially with lowered CD when traited) and Staff 2-5 when traited.
Most classes have some form of flat damage mitigation while being able to still complete actions (stone heart, distortion, etc) while an engineer relies on BLOCKS that lock out all actions but still can be penetrated by MANY skill(or elixir S which leaves you screwed by condis and still lock out your actions),
most other classes mitigation is not countered as easily and as obviously.

3. Lack of defensive traits

We have tons of healing with our new traits with decent uptime on protection as always. This ties into the above, but once again we have very little truly good defensive traits.
AMR now has A SUPER high CD, and the bug that it has with healing turrets overcharge majorly affects its performance.

4. Our role.

We don’t have a place.
OUr builds the moment are hard damage via Marauders SD or similar burst builds. However that position is very much filled by mesmer, with more AOE/single target damage and more mobility AND more mitigation, and to a lesser degree thief, more mobility and more single target damage.
We can also run tanky support just fine, but this again is outclassed by MILES by bunker guards or Eles.

5. Stability and CC.

CC and stability as always been a strong way to counter engineers, but its worth mentioning this aggregates the issue post patch.
Engineers depends on CC to get damage out as most of our damage is on AOE and ground targeting skills. If we can’t pin down our opponent, we can’t bring the damage out.
As a class that lacks decent stability, unless you run the terrible FT, we get CC’D to hell from Mesmers and warriors while we are completely unable to counter while they have their stab/distortion up.

6. Lackluster damage traits.

Need I say more?
So many reasons why I can say this, just go look at explosives and firearms. I mean REALLY.

Finally
7. condition changes.

Bleeding has always been a great source of added kick for an engineer, sure IP was our bread and butter and definitely a strong trait prepatch, but now that bleeding is gutted even with high condi numbers we lose out on a LOT!
Even IP is pretty bad post patch when you compare it to other classes burning burst potential, ele and guard for some.

As an engineer main I am quite sad to feel useless when playing PvP in pugs and even premade games.
I feel like rerolling anything but a Ranger yields better results than running engi. Even if just SLIGHTLY better in some cases, but I do feel much better when not running engi.

It scares me to think that the class I enjoy the most is now, BAD, not from a meta perspective, but from MY perspective while PLAYING it.

I hope that this can somehow be fixed even if I don’t have decent suggestions on how to go about fixing the power creep that left Engis (and rangers) behind.

Even with the Spec update changing a lot, it’s clear I was right when I said that Engi was being carried by the old Cele ammy. What you said about damage mitigation didn’t really change much and now that Cele isn’t king Engi went down with it. I love the flavor of the class but now it just feels almost as weak as War and Ranger.

SD builds can be strong but do little that Mes doesn’t do better.

BurrTheKing.8571:

Even with the Spec update changing a lot, it’s clear I was right when I said that Engi was being carried by the old Cele ammy. What you said about damage mitigation didn’t really change much and now that Cele isn’t king Engi went down with it. I love the flavor of the class but now it just feels almost as weak as War and Ranger.

SD builds can be strong but do little that Mes doesn’t do better.

While not completely wrong about cele amulet carrying the engi. Condi builds(rabid) prepatch at least felt good and often useful, this isn’t the case anymore.

Issues facing the engineer and every other class (apart from mesmer) in pvp:

1. Mesmer.

This is the post I made the other day summing up my current feelings when playing my engi alt.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/engineer/All-I-do-is-Run-Away/first#post5322724

JoshuaRAWR.4653:

Issues facing the engineer and every other class (apart from mesmer) in pvp:

1. Mesmer.

2. Necro… But this has always been the case.

sigil of smouldering and a 20% duration burn rune go a long way if you have both IP and IA(FT).

cele was right for the time when combined with stat increases from the trait lines.

with the 6-23 change power stat got a large increase and condi was increased by the scaling mechanic, in comparison cele still provides the same stats as prepatch. cele engi doesnt get the stat increase they had when going for the grenadier trait nor does cele give enough condi dmg to be meaningful.

even if IP was still in the explosives line it wouldnt make much of a difference. anet has decided to kill hybrid builds. engi still might be good if it werent for the overwhelming pressure from ele/mes/burning meta.

I wouldnt count on balance changes anytime soon.

Im not super experienced as engi, but id say we have good teamfighting. In addition, im glad grenades are the most viable weapon since they take relati e skill to use, and although i dont like engis in their current spot im glad the interesting kits are the viable ones. People say its a burst meta and a tanky aoe dps serves little purpse in that.

At the end of the day we are ele but with worse sustain and worse 1v1 but with more cheesy we win buttons, such as mass moa. I think devs have ele nerfs planned and our utility should be compared to theirs after the nerfs

I personally don’t think rifle engi is in that bad of a spot right now. They can have great burst and great mobility/survivability (sometimes) and pretty good sustained damage. But I do agree on the point that they don’t have much of an identity right now.

I really want to see condi be viable on the level of power rifle, that would help a lot. Engineer should be one of the most diverse classes but no one is using flamethrower, no one is using bombs, no one is using dual pisols, etc.

I’d especially like if engi could be a viable hybrid, considering so many of their skills/kits combine decent raw power with bleed/burn/poison/confuse etc. Engi used to be good at applying a little bit of everything but now they can’t compete with burst condis. It hurts me to see all engineers running soldier/marauder rifle.

And this is personal but I dislike HGH might stacking now. The micromanaging is annoying and I’m not for classes being able to maintain 25 stacks of might.

Reicta.2178:

I personally don’t think rifle engi is in that bad of a spot right now. They can have great burst and great mobility/survivability (sometimes) and pretty good sustained damage. But I do agree on the point that they don’t have much of an identity right now.

I really want to see condi be viable on the level of power rifle, that would help a lot. Engineer should be one of the most diverse classes but no one is using flamethrower, no one is using bombs, no one is using dual pisols, etc.

I’m running a flamethrower build…. with a reasonable success rate too, the only problem i have with it is it’s a very selfish build with little team support. but can be useful when defending a point in 1v1’s (well except against condi as we have so little condi cleanse)

Hmm, I don’t think engi is in a great place, but it’s good and probably one of the more balanced profs. While I agree to some extent with some of the OP’s points, I disagree with more:

1) The amount of blind affects all other professions just as much. If this is a criticism against the meta as a whole, that’s fine, but there’s not much that’s engineer-specific, particularly since we got a whole extra blind field on Mortar.

2) Eh, I don’t think this is a big issue. Gear Shield is our only block and while it’s a pretty big skill for engis, I think the issues with block affect Guardians more and they’re still doing fine.

3) AMR could use a more reasonable cooldown (above 10, but below 90), but I’m ok with the defensive traits as a whole, even if they’re not overwhelming. Between bunker down and the alchemy line, we get a pretty decent amount of constant healing.

4) The Engi role has never been that specific since it’s a pretty hybrid-focused profession, but as usual, we do really well with CC. I’d say that we’re a high CC role that brings a bit more hybrid utility than something like a hammer war.

5) Yea, Engis don’t have a ton of stab, but all classes have some degree of weakness. I feel like we have enough other ways to avoid or handle CC outside of stab, particularly with the Elixir X and Mortar kit buffs.

6) I agree on this. If we could go into both firearms and explosives, this may not be an issue, but losing out on mobility (inventions or tools) and defense (alchemy) is just too much. It’d be nice to see firearms and Explosives good enough to

7) Yea, bleeding could use some love.

Overall, I don’t think engi is as bad off as many people say they are, I do think that condi specs need some love in the form of bug fixes (pistol AA needs to be explosion and bomb kit needs fixes) and trait adjustments so that they’re not so bad off without explosives and firearms. The latter may be the biggest reason that power engi builds are the meta atm since you can pull off power with just explosives, but condition without explosives and firearms is pretty rough.

Engineer isn’t in a terrible spot, it is the other classes that are in a great spot. Necro mancer used to have counter play pre-patch but the necromancer would most likely win it. Now it is litterly impossible if you are running condi or power. I would be okay if it was only necro but mesmer and ele can simply destroy engineer and that is the only reason we feel weak. The problem isn’t buffing our class, but nerfing the others. After all, buffing a class can introduce a lot of undesirable results (mesmer for example.) It is always better to nerf than buff. Less variables and much better results.

TL;DR: Engi is in a good spot on its own, but when compared to the current OPs it is far worse.

Going to disagree with a lot of what the OP said.

1. Blinds
I don’t see this a major problem. The power of blinds against engineer varies by build, just like it does with every other profession. If you’re blinded, then don’t use a key CC or damage ability. And with the automatic utility goggles trait, it’s not so bad. Certainly not as bad as blinds against a hammer warrior.

2. Unblockable
Mirror Blade shouldn’t be unblockable. The damage and utility combined with the relatively low cooldown don’t warrant it. Unblockable should be reserved for utility effects with low or no damage from them skill itself, or ground-target over-time or charge-up effects. I never saw the logic in giving out unblockable to high damage skills when evades still work on those skills.

Besides Mirror blade, Phoenix is the only high damage unblockable skill. Phoenix’s unique mechanic may require it, however (otherwise it would fail often against a group). Traited necro marks are debatable. They’re as much for utility as they are for damage.

3. Defensive Traits
Engineer doesn’t need that many defensive traits. One of the themes of the profession is control, and controlling opponents stops them from doing damage to you. That offensive control also helps you on defense. This playstyle works fine except against players who can’t be CC’ed due to stability, condition immunity, or stealth.

4. Role
Engineer changed considerably with the patch, so its role is still solidifying. Comparing it to mesmer (up until today) or d/d ele (until that gets nerfed) is doing it a disservice, since nothing else could/can compete. I’ve seen engineer work as a skirmisher and a point holder (BigZam in EU Go4Gups). With all the CC, it can probably find a role with de-capping enemies too. It just needs some time and for outliers to be reigned in.

5. Stability and CC
Mesmer was completely OP (nerfed today) and Rampage from warrior was also nerfed. Lack of self-stability isn’t that bad, but which abilities could be re-examined.

6. Damage Traits
Mostly agree. The big issue is that the Firearms line goes overboard on crit chance in place of damage bonuses. That leaves Explosives as one of the few ways to boost damage output. The other lines are defense/utility, so lack of increase damage isn’t that unexpected.

7. Conditions
Incendiary Powder was way too strong pre-patch and IMO should still be re-worked to have counter-play options. Bleeds at high condition damage are close to where they were pre-patch. Only burning got hit hard and burning was the majority of a condi or cele engineer’s damage. You’re just highlighting how ridiculously strong IP was pre-patch and how it carried engineer.

I played engineer as my second profession and really enjoyed it. I gave up on it shortly after this patch, but I’m starting to realize that was a bit premature. Engineer changed a lot, and trying to run what you had before more than likely won’t work. You need to view engineer like you did when you were still somewhat new to the game. Experiment with various trait combinations, utilities you didn’t used before, etc.

One item I will add though:
Grenade Kit
This kit needs toned down in order to make engineer more well-rounded. Grenade kit does damage similar to a melee weapon from range with tons of utility (conditions, vulnerability stacking). It’s hard to improve other skills when Grenade Kit is as strong as it is currently. If you improved other skills and traits without toning down Grenade Kit, engineer would quickly become overpowered.

1. Blinds
Only issue I see regarding blinds are the RANDOM blinds. Like with ele’s blind on burn trait, it causes a ton of random blinds to occur and end up blinding key skills for the engineer to land WITHOUT REQUIRING ANY SORT OF SKILL from the ele. Mesmer’s on demand shatter blind can be a nuisance but considering they have to sacrifice a shatter to do so it doesn’t bother me that much, worse issue is their insane access to stun.

2. Unblockable
I agree things like mirror blade should not be unblockable with their low cd and high damage. Necro marks I’m okay with I just think condi transfers need to not use their original applicant’s condi damage as the transfer. It makes necro too much of a hard counter to condi builds in general but the worst off is condi engi due to their limited condi clears. When power necros hard counter condi engi because of passive transfers or instant transfer using the engis condi damage there is something wrong imo.

3. Defensive Traits
By themselves yeah some are underwhelming but they synergize well together which makes them much stronger than you’d think. I do think engi needs to have more defenses available outside of a block and invuln that is still countered by any condis.

4. CC and Stability
Engi needs to have more stnbreaks available to it or some stability added if anet is going to allow every other class to posses so much cc. Take mesmers for example, they have the ability to practically spam stuns on a foe. When said foe is an engi with only 1 stunbreak because they have to use kits to have any versatility (only 1 kit actually gives a stunbreak and it’s not a terribly common kit in many builds now) you can see how this fight would play out. Given that mesmers also outheal and can go invuln more often than the engi, there’s no chance for it to win a fight assuming the Mesmer actually knows what their skills do.

Only commented on the ones I had a super strong feeling about. Others I have opinions on but they aren’t strong enough to share about at this point in time.

Dahkeus.8243:

Hmm, I don’t think engi is in a great place, but it’s good and probably one of the more balanced profs. While I agree to some extent with some of the OP’s points, I disagree with more:

1) The amount of blind affects all other professions just as much. If this is a criticism against the meta as a whole, that’s fine, but there’s not much that’s engineer-specific, particularly since we got a whole extra blind field on Mortar.

More of an observation on why it is quite bad for engis, not really specific to us though.

I agree with the op with almost everything. Every profession and build should have counter play. Engineer has 2 major weaknesses:
- relatively weak condition removal (still true)
- relatively weak to hard CC due limited access to stability and not that many valid stun breaks

I am fine with BOTH of these weaknesses staying as I also don’t want engineer to become overpowered like elementalist and mesmer. The biggest problem is the lack of trait line synergy after Jun 23 changes.

Engineer lacks a specific role. Yes, engi can be built to be a bunker, but guardian and elementalist do that better. Thief and mesmer are far superior roamers with lots of combat mobility, burst and ability to disengage. Ele, guardian and warrior offer better group support. Necromancer can counter condition builds and has superb boon stripping. Ranger is superior at long range with long bow and has better sustain, heals, condi removal and evasion needed to contest points. Perhaps for all these reasons engineer was never meta in WvWvW and I feel it is no longer meta in spvp either. You can play engineer in spvp and win (my win rate is still about 50%), but selecting another profession allows it to be done easier.

Almost everybody agrees that medkit is now extremely cumbersome and annoying to use with the ground targeting. I really hope the old “drop the vial/bandages” behavior is brought back in or at least remove the overly long activation times as now one needs to spend more than half of the match up time just using the medkit in combat (and doing zero damage at same time). Otherwise the overwhelming majority of engineers are locked to healing turret, which is still one of the best heals in the game. Toolkit and/or elixir S also feel more or less mandatory, limiting build diversity.

Majority of the gadgets, except for slick shoes, see relatively little use as the gadgets are so situational and don’t offer versatile utility nor much dps. Gagdeteer is a weak GM trait: 20% conditional cd reduction and gaining very slightly improved version of gadget, while most engineers don’t take any gadgets or max 1 gadget.

Shaped charge is not just boring, but also very weak master level trait, giving mere 5% conditional damage buff and zero utility. I would replace the trait, but it must stay at least make it increase the vulnerability duration by 50% as well.

Siege rounds is an okay trait, but feels weak for GM trait. It is tied to one elite kit and yet without this kit, mortar is really not worth taking. Mortar feels like a weak version of elementalist staff, which offers more utility (e.g. ranged area stun with static field) and much improved radius, and also better burst damage. Ele staff requires no traits to function at full power.

Thermobaric Detonation sounded nice on paper, but works really bad in real life as dodges are needed to avoid enemy bursts. It needs a total rework. Shrapnel used to be adept trait, now it is GM trait, which is really only useful if you use the grenade kit and have lots of enemies to hit them all the time.

Some minor traits are really lackluster: e.g. energy amplifier, which is GM minor and offers a conditional +250 buff to healing power (most useless stat). Heal resonator has too small radius to make it actually useful support trait for allies. Soothing detonation heals so little that would anybody ever take it? Medical Dispersion Field doesn’t work in real life either, small radius & return.

Turrets were not just nerfed, they were pretty much deleted from the game, already before the patch. Turrets were never popular in dungeon runs or WvWvW. Now turrets are horrible in every game mode. The low health of turrets also makes the turret related traits worthless, besides exploding turrets.

Grenade kit has been subject to numerous nerfs since it was first nerfed in 2012. I think Arenanet went a bit overboard with the nerfs. Now it has only 900 range (no trait to increase the range), zero utility (no fields, no finishers) and relatively low damage multipliers on the slow recharging skills e.g. freeze grenade. I would have retained some utility in the grenade kit.

Rifle range was finally corrected yesterday and it is major change, but elixir gun still suffers from limited range of 900 (vs 1200).

Bomb kit is simply not viable outside soloing camps in WvWvW and pve. The bomb radius shows 240 radius in animation, but the real radius is still smaller (bug or intended behavior, no reply from devs?).

I think this discussion might need to be moved to engineer specific forums. I made there my list of suggested changes to engineer traits and skills (mostly tweaking some numbers or bringing back existing, but removed, behavior). My list also includes some nerfs:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/engineer/Suggested-Engineer-trait-skill-changes/

If you look at class strength over-all in spvp since the day this game launched the engineer is probably 2nd behind elementalist in over-all strength over time. God help they be average for a couple weeks.

Engineer right now could use some small buffs, but I think most of their problems come from two things. (outside of overtuned mes/ele)

1) Engineer is still full of bugs since the update. (bomb radius, projectile finisher not cleansing without an enemy (mortar), weird skill queue with static discharge, pistol 1 not an explosive, automatic bomb dispenser is not currently dropping the intended bomb, just a blind that ticks twice, etc.)

2) There is still a lot of work to bring engineer traits up to speed. Previously, engineer was one of the most versatile classes, which means their traits and utilities had a lot of variability. They were one of they few successful professions with the old trait system. However, by decreasing choice, and removing a lot of options that existed previously, we have been weakened in many ways. A lot of options that existed previously, are gone. (pistol range, healing bombs, swiftness on kit without an added ability, old gadgeteer, turret damage, no F5 for racial elites, etc.)

We have a profession that is still months away from being ready for the recent changes. A lot of work has to be done to complete the update with the engineer. Bug fixes, trait adjustments, and inclusions of old traits.

I think the profession is still fun, and even viable for most things, but it feels incomplete with the recent update. It is too bad a lot of these bugs will take so long to tackle, and the adjustments I mentioned would require a similar level of dedication as when we got the trait revamp, which is unlikely.