Guild Wars 2

Juggernaut:

Add the 15% damage increase from Deadly Mixture to Juggernaut, but bump it up to to 20-25%), and remove the might stacking component, and add 20% reduction of FT cooldowns. Then move Juggernaut to a tier II trait. Create a new tier 3 trait to replace juggernaut… i.e., gain might on critical hits (not weapon or kit specific).

As for the 200 toughness: see kit refinement below.

Deadly Mixture:

Change the deadly mixture trait to an elixir gun only boost… 15-20% increase in healing power, reduction of cooldowns on EG by 20%.

Kit refinement:

Change the trait again to give passive benefits depending on the kit you have equipped.

Med Kit: +200 Healing Power
Flamethrower: +200 Toughness
Elixir Gun: +200 Vitality
Bombs: +200 Condition Damage
Grenades: +200 Power
Toolkit: +200 Precision

Thoughts?

I think those traits were OK the way they were. Your proposed changes to Juggernaut seem too overpowered for the master skill level. Calling something deadly and making it make you heal better seems a little backwards to me as well. The cooldown on KR is unpopular though because engineers want to be able to reliably get the effect they want from kit swapping. The way it is, Anet has redesigned the trait to be more like a RNG bonus if you equip multi-kits. Bottom line, if you take the trait you get a random free boon/effect that you wouldn’t otherwise have had.

What were you really trying to go for? Not wanting to spread trait points so much between the firearms and alchemy trees? I’m not clear on your rationale for suggesting the changes.

Wenrolio.8063:

What were you really trying to go for? Not wanting to spread trait points so much between the firearms and alchemy trees? I’m not clear on your rationale for suggesting the changes.

This and that we have to take so many traits spread across multiple lines just to make Flamethrower viable.

I gotcha. How are you defining viable? For instance, what do you want it to do?

If you challenge your viewpoint on the kit and what you want to get out of it you may find that you don’t want to really use the flamethrower in the first place. Maybe. I don’t think that Anet will ever drop all the kit traits into one tree. I think they want to foster build variety and a sense of risk/reward in our build choices.

The way I view it, the FT 1 skill hits many times in one round, each hit can crit, and we have a slew of traits that give on crit perks. That’s good. The weapon itself scales pretty well with power (2 ability), the on crit traits are mostly condition damage, with the exception of precise sights. That suggests that a FT build scales fairly evenly between power and condi dmg, with a bias to power. Might stacking in juggernaut is pretty awesome for that. The range of the FT is pretty short so the toughness is also pretty nice for that.

The deadly mixture trait only affects the direct damage portion of the FT at a cost of 20 trait points. I have found that I do more damage if I take those same 20 points and invest them in the explosives tree and get the enhanced performance trait for more might which affects both direct and condition damage. As an added bonus, the build can pick up burning on crits and condition duration for higher vulnerability stacks, and the extra power and vulnerability can work well with a rifle, or the might and extra condition duration can work well with pistols for quick swaps out of FT for bursting cooldowns from those weapons. The last part of the FT build I’d use would be speedy kits and vigor on swiftness to allow the juggernaut to close the distance on enemies quickly as well as the ability to evade enemy burst. I tend to pair the FT with the medkit, rocket boots for more burning (could also use goggles for more vulnerability), and the elixir gun.

For the way that I play, this approach to the FT is more viable than a grenade build. I can do more damage because I don’t miss grenade tosses and don’t have to manage my pointer location and screen movement at the same time. I also get more control and can offer a long combo field for other ranged classes to shoot through. When I swap to my main weapons, I have awesome might stacks and condition duration to help with even more dmg. To me, those are the strengths of the FT.

If I want to do max dmg in aoe at max range, I’d then look into grenades.

My point is, try to find out what you expect out of the kit and then try to determine if it is a realistic expectation. I’d love to instagib anyone with fiery death from maximum range, but I don’t see it fitting into the game mechanic.

ya, but the FT traits are put in places that are beneficial stat wise for the FT user.

30 points in firearms = 300 pre = more crit, plus might stacks and toughness which make up for the lack of necessary Explosives and Inventions traits
(incendiary powder, imo, is a must)

20 points in Alchemy gives vita (always nice in cond heavy matches) plus a host of useful adept traits (vigor, elixir s, protection injection) and the much needed boon duration for making those might stacks count.

20 free points can go where you want.

More tanky? 20 Inventions, take shield and cloak or metal plating and energized armor and bunker up.
More pew pew? 20 Explosives and get Enhanced Performance, or take shrapnel and APT and be a hybrid bunker.
More elixirs? HGH and 409 are always nice, so is Backpack regenerator .. not to mention the extra boon duration and vita.
More utility? Static Discharge, Speedy Kits, Kit Refinement, Toolkit Trait, what have you, 20 Tools also adds crit dmg (nice for a build that crits a lot) and Toolbelt recharge.

To be frank, the trait allocation for a full FT build is very well thought out and placed, one of the best allocations we have next to HGH, imo.

I disapprove of your suggestions.

I don’t see this idea of KR being more useful that it’s current incarnation—it’s equally reliable regardless how many kits you’re toggling through, but it also has a lot less utility and probably wouldn’t be able to give a +200 stat increase at an adept-trait anyway. Maybe more like 50-75. I’d say your Juggernaut is also too powerful for a Master trait and would still need to be up in the GM tier, with which you might as well keep the +200 toughness on it.

I would like to see its base damage and some traits (like DM) adjusted to make it a little less trait-reliant, or give it more broad utility because at the moment it’s a good primary kit, but really not worth it if you’re not investing into it—a problem I don’t think the other kits have near as much of.

To be honest what I’d really like to see is Air Blast being usable while stunned, since it is an instant cast. Gives the kit two non-damaging, melee-range pseudo-stunbreakers which I don’t think would be overpowered since they’re mostly time-buyers and the Mesmer staff has basically the same thing with Phase Retreat and Chaos Armor.

Great stuff here.

I really appreciate ALL of the VERY thoughtful responses. I know I have learned something.

I have been going more tanky with a 0/30/20/20/0 build, but as a result of the replies, I think I’m going to play around with 20 in explosives for additional might stacking from enhanced performance and incendiary power.

Would you suggest a sigil of superior strength for additional might stacking?

If not, what sigils do you suggest to run with a flamethrower build?

And thank you all again for all of your input.

Are you gonna run with a rifle or pistol-pistol/shield? The latter’ll let you fit two sigils at once, so you could probably fit sigil of strength with any other one and not have to choose between.

I wonder about Sigil of Battle since we can swap in and out fast enough it’s a easy proc for 3 stacks at 20 seconds, and taking Might-duration runes which are percentage based so you might be able to get a bigger bang for your buck with that if you have to take one or the other. But you could take both + might duration runes + Juggernaut + Enhanced Performance, you’d be able to keep probably almost, if not entirely, full stacks of might (Esp. since the duration would stack on your 20% boon duration from 20 in alchemy).

I run with rifle, though, and actually take Sigil of Energy for the on-demand dodge, because I have no endurance-regen traits. If you can fit invigorating speed in there (although I personally have a hard time justifying it over DM and self-regulating defenses/protection injection) and carry a med-kit/elixir B/some sort of on-demand Swiftness it’s a lot less necessary. If you mostly fight in combat with a lot of enemies you can burn down easily, Sigil of Stamina is a full endurance on kill which makes for a really nice alternative.

I don’t like passive stats bonuses, as I think they’re boring. Kit Refinement is supposed to be a fun interactive trait. Simply giving it a passive stat boost seems like a step down the wrong path. But i do agree that KR needs to be tweeked.

As for Deadly Mixtures and Juggernaut…I don’t have any problem with where they are currently. I’m wondering what the purpose of these changes is. Is it to give each EG & FT their own trait? I use both, so I like that Deadly Mixtures helps both my kits with a 20pt investment.

Making Jugg 20pt trait would be OP imo too. Also, boosting the +dmg from Jugg rather than keeping the might stacking further reduces the dynamics of the trait. The purpose of the might stacking is to reward the player for staying in FT longer. Bestowing a flat stat increase bypasses that.

I think Juggernaut should remain the way it is.

As for Deadly Mixture, I would like to see this changed. The Flamethrower has to spread 60 points among 3 different trees to get optimal damage out of it that actually makes it competitive to the Bomb Kit and Grenade Kit.

60 points. Juggernaut. Deadly Mixture. Incendiary Powder.

The traits that boost the Bomb Kit and Grenade Kit are both only in Explosives by comparison—and the Bomb Kit doesn’t even have to go to 30.

Why the trait discrepancy? There’s nothing about the Flamethrower that makes it obvious to me that it earns such a trait dependency where I literally have 10 points to distribute elsewhere.

Phineas Poe.3018:

Why the trait discrepancy? There’s nothing about the Flamethrower that makes it obvious to me that it earns such a trait dependency where I literally have 10 points to distribute elsewhere.

Not saying it’s justified, but I think it’s because the FT has the potential to fit into many typed of builds (power, precision, condition).

Seras.5702:

Not saying it’s justified, but I think it’s because the FT has the potential to fit into many typed of builds (power, precision, condition).

The Grenade Kit just as much fills the same potential yet only requires speccing into Explosives.

Phineas Poe.3018:

Seras.5702:

Not saying it’s justified, but I think it’s because the FT has the potential to fit into many typed of builds (power, precision, condition).

The Grenade Kit just as much fills the same potential yet only requires speccing into Explosives.

Was just typing this. The deadly mixtures trait imo should be moved to the firearms tree…maybe even combined with something else (rifle damage trait etc?). I cant see how this would hurt anything.

I think Juggernaut and Deadly Mixture are each fine. What they really need is to be put in the same trait line.

The KR suggestion looks promising. (I love the thinking about a trait that genuinely supports multi-kit play. Does it need it’s own label to distinguish it from the current 10pt trait Kit Refinement in the Tools line? ‘Empowered Kits’ perhaps.)

like i said, there is more to traits than just the effect of each trait. there are also the stat gains from the trees themselves.

you are not just getting 15% ft or eg dmg, you are also getting 200 vitality and 20% boon duration.

I get that, but I would rather make the conscious decision to go for 200 Vitality and 20% Boon Duration because I wanted that, like any other Engineer does. Instead with the Flamethrower I feel tethered by a meticulously designated trait selection that merely puts the Flamethrower on par with other kits while they can put 30 points in Explosives and spend their other 40 elsewhere.

There’s nothing inherent about the Flamethrower that makes a 60-point trait dependency OK. It’s not like the Flamethrower is by and far the best kit we have with that amount of investment; it’s arguably still inferior to the Grenade Kit even then.

MrSilver.5269:

Juggernaut:

Change the trait again to give passive benefits depending on the kit you have equipped.

Med Kit: +200 Healing Power
Flamethrower: +200 Toughness
Elixir Gun: +200 Vitality
Bombs: +200 Condition Damage
Grenades: +200 Power
Toolkit: +200 Precision

Thoughts?

I kinda like this idea a lot, but I think a better line up would be:
Med Kit: +200 Healing Power
Flamethrower: +200 Toughness
Elixir Gun: +200 Vitality
Bombs: +200 Power (This is the hardest hitting direct damage kit in the game, shouldn’t have condition on it.)
Grenades: +100 Power +100 Condition Damage
Toolkit: +200 Condition Damage (Pretty much this kits only offensive use is it’s confusion from it’s Prybar)

The reason I left Precision out of all of this is because 200 precision = about 10% crit chance. That is too overpowered. Then again maybe halfing kit refinement bonuses to 100 would be more balanced.

My only worry is that if this is too powerful that it will now force all builds to pick up this trait.

I went with precision on toolkit because it pairs well with crit damage, and because practically there is less likelihood that you are going to miss if you are trying to hit someone pointblank with a wrench.

I’m fine with 200 power on bombs, and 100/100 on grenades.

Maybe switch med kit to 200 vitality, and make elixir gun 200 healing power.

… and thanks for your response!

I wouldnt bother with vitality on any. That would basicly be like magically gaining 200 vitality of health everytime you swap into a kit, then losing it when you swap out…..so it would feel like i was attacking myself everytime i swapped out. Stats that effect performance like toughness or power etc, are fine. Stats that add to a pool however not cool

MrSilver, this seems more like something you would see in the Inventions line. The inventions line seems to offer the most benefits to players who use multiple kits. Or did, anyway.

Since the devs are set on making KR act differently (I still don’t understand a 20 CD), why not remove it, put this idea where Adrenal Implants are, then move Adrenal Implants farther down the line?