Guild Wars 2

One in particular game element seems to have been skipped over when Signets received their numeric buff effectively doubling their effectiveness a patch or two ago, and that one would be Reinforced Shield. This trait was once scaled directly against the attribute gain granted by the Warrior’s Dolyak Signet in terms of toughness granted at maximum level. However this is no longer the case and renders the option, as good as it may be, improperly balanced within the meta numbers game. As numerical fixes are relatively easy to do for the development team I imagine something could be done about this is the next round of patches. Here’s what it looks like:

Current: +90 toughness while holding a shield…
Adjustment: +180 toughness while holding a shield… OR Grants a bonus to toughness = 2 x (10 + level) while holding a shield…

I genuinely cannot think of a single reason why this shouldn’t be implemented. Anyone out there have any insight or convincing arguments that might enlighten me as to why they should keep Reinforced Shield at +90?

I agree.

In my “Some Questions” thread, I also point out that while I understand the flavor reasons for not giving us signets, it robs us of buffs that are not boons. Boons are vulnerable to stripping, hate, and stealing.

Because this is how the guardian and warrior traits behave. Buff one, buff all 3. Or potentially diversify them.

Kamahl.3621:

Because this is how the guardian and warrior traits behave. Buff one, buff all 3. Or potentially diversify them.

The numerical values, because of signet passives for both Guardians and Warriors, was a +90 advantage over the Engineer, which is a fair balance for a heavy armor class. However the adjustment gives them a +180 passive advantage which is not compensated for within the Engineers class, I.E. no higher damage coefficients, hp gain, or direct toughness to toughness equality. This means they’ve reduced comparative survivability by not differentiating trait bonuses between the medium armor class with no access to signers, and heavy armor classes with signets.

Even if using a 50% scaling the Engineer trait should give a minimum +135 bonus to toughness.

The only other way to balance this would be to select a skill type (Gadgets would be good) and give them all passive abilities to mirror signet passives. This however would require much more development time and effort than changing a single integer in a single line. I would prefer this method as it would better match options given to literally every other class, but that’s a discussion for a different thread.

That’s all not to say I don’t see where you come from as the traits all reflect one another for shields. The problem is that when the Signet got improved, Engineers got nothing to compensate and what was once numerically balanced now isn’t.