Guild Wars 2

imaginary.6241:

Their basic statement about the Warrior is still the same. Thiefs will get HIGHER inviative regeneration (and I can only see changes to Traits in that post concerning Thiefs) and most of their abnormal spaming escape, gap closer abilities comes from weapon abilities and utilites. So bascially they ‘ll recieve a buff on that part as if that wasn’t over the top already. But maybe they’re at least a bit more vulernable to conditions now in sPvP. Thought, I’m not much of a Thief Player so maybe I did read that wrong and it ’s a more clever solution hindering them from spamming inviative?

Also Warrior only gets a nerf for their Earthshaker-Damage and redability and it doesn’t change the other facts I posted above. In addition to that I didn’t ment for them to provide a solution / change warriors or thiefs but complained about the changes to Engineer concerning Vigor as it ’s one of our few abilities to migrate Damage especially when going pure Glass (which for example Thief and Warrior are fine without that Boon as their active weapon utilities allow them for a easy Escape).

Vigor only increases the Indurance Regeneration by 100% and not magically fills the Bar out or provides an additional Escape like the above classes have. Thought you are right about getting Vigor from Firearms (which still forces you to crit beforehand and as I said isn’t magically filling up the Bar and take some time).

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.

Warrior mobility still is insane. However, the mobility is on a different weapon set than the annoying CC build (H/LB or H/M or whatever). It’s not like they get it all in one build. And hopefully the Hammer and Unsuspecting Foe changes will tone down the damage for their CC builds.

Regarding Thieves I think you are way overestimating the passive 33% buff. The passiv initiative regeneration is very slow. Right now they regenerate initiative through different traits and almost all of them were nerfed.

• Opportunist: 1i on crit (30% chance, 1s idc) now is 1i on crit (50% chance, 5s idc). Big nerf for allmost all Thieves.
• Signet Use: 2i on Signet use now is 1i (50% nerf)
• Infusion of Shadow: Changed from 2i per s when using a skill which causes stealth to 2i when entering stealth. This is a big nerf to perma stealth and initiative regeneration.
• Quick Recovery: Got changed from 2i every 10s while in combat to 1i (50% nerf).
• Kleptomanic: Reduced from 3i on steal to 2i (33% nerf).

Additionally, Thieves got their Vigor nerfed massively which affects them a lot more than Engineers because they are squishier and have less sustain within a fight.

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. You can get Vigor from other sources. It is silly to complain about that. It is as ridiciulous to complain about Speedy Kits as those Warriors who claim that Mace is dead because of an animation change and a 0.25s longer activiation time for Skull Crack.

Maskaganda.2043:

The change to IP will hurt. Not sure if what I’ll roll now, might go 30 points into firearms or back to 20 in inventions.
What bothers me most is losing those 10% condition duration from explosives. Two options here, givers weapon or the new toxic consumables.

Transmute change is nice tho.

From someone who is running AR in a zerk hybrid in wvw im sad to se transmute nerfed like this. Only situation this Will have its moment is when using guards to gain stealth for escaping with throw bolas thanks to cloak, or if a necro is stupid enough to beginn the burst by entering deathshroud and fearing you without a bleed bomb. Usually im all in for more Control over the effects, but as Long as the application of conditions themselves is as random as it is it Will still effectively just be as random as it was with less protection against Heavy condition pressure. I liked that the more pressure your oponents spat out, the more aid you got against them. And even if you had a million necromancers spamming you you would still get 8 percent less bleeds, poisons, torments and so on. If a player over the Course of 15 seconds applied 12 conditions to you it would in that scenario be equivalent, and by this i include not Only the number of Times they are applied but also the size of the stacks, meaning that if say a theoretical skill applied 25 stacks of bleed, with the New version it would become 24 stacks of bleed and a few seconds of regeneration, and with the old it would become 23 stacks with twice as Long regen. And the New one would then be on recharge while the old is ready to eat more. It worked well as a statistical weapon against conditions as those often had a large sample size during a fight. You Will be able to laugh at the poor sod throwing a bola as an opener, but Most of the fight it Will go wasted on a auto bleed from someone turning it to a few seconds of regen. Currently the power warrior spamming his 30/40 damage bleed does not affect the chance to turn the necromancers 120+ bleeds Into regen, or vulnerability Into protection, or the fear Into stability. With this patch it Will. Its one of the few random traits that Works well, and one that scales with the task ahead. Now it Will counter the builds with no random condition application (and how many are those?) but with Only a few select important conditions such as a warrior with fear or bolas or a mesmer who goes for the shatter immobilize (if you Do not get hit by the 1s cripple, nor by any exploding clone 15 seconds before or hit by an auto or a sigil proc or a proc trait or Another player spamming his auto and so on). Sorry for the weird formating, writing on a phone.

Xaylin.1860:

Warrior mobility still is insane. However, the mobility is on a different weapon set than the annoying CC build (H/LB or H/M or whatever). It’s not like they get it all in one build. And hopefully the Hammer and Unsuspecting Foe changes will tone down the damage for their CC builds.

Regarding Thieves I think you are way overestimating the passive 33% buff. The passiv initiative regeneration is very slow. Right now they regenerate initiative through different traits and almost all of them were nerfed.

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. You can get Vigor from other sources. It is silly to complain about that. It is as ridiciulous to complain about Speedy Kits as those Warriors who claim that Mace is dead because of an animation change and a 0.25s longer activiation time for Skull Crack.

Yes you’re right about the Changes for both the Thief as well as the Warriors, I just didn’t get them at first sight. I’ve updated my initial post to make my point more understanding about Build Diversity concerning Engineers and removed some bolt text to clear up missunderstandings.

Edit @ miriforst.1290:

Pretty good point concerning the Condition Spam that most Classes put out even with their Auto-Attack. This trait would work if the basic problem of all those covering Condition Spams from people not even going Conditions wouldn’t exist. Especially when you are focused from multiple Players at once.

That goes for Armor Mods as well. Both of them need to be PER PLAYER to make them viable for >Multi-Player< (phun intended!) and not just for non-clever duels with some PUG (or random times in fights, when you don’t need them at all).

Terrahero.9358:

These are some pretty significant nerfs.

This is true, at least from a PvP standpoint. I’m not disappointed because I think engineers were already extremely strong in PvP, and the only reason they haven’t been dominant there is that necros are a hard counter to condi engineers. Also, the current state of warriors makes condi builds incredibly difficult.

I’m a bit disappointed that warrior is just receiving a small damage nerf; I don’t think that will help much. Necro also received just a small damage nerf. So necro will still hard counter condi engineer, and warriors will still passive tank everything. If those changes are handled better, I think the engineer nerfs will be very needed; but as it is, it looks like that’s not the case.

Even if you believe some classes are OP in sPvP you also posted that there is a Hard Counter. Thats Balance. If that class has a specific role and another one a counter role it should be fine to some point unless it ‘s really over the top and can’t be countered or only countered with really strong and exhausting skillplay while the OP one doesn’t require equal skillplay in return. And I disagree with you that condi Engis are unbalanced like that.

That goes without saying that significantly weakening a key role / functionality when it wasn’t over the top and not giving it something equal in return is always a bad idea (as a basic idea, related to every balance change classwide).

DesertRose.2031:

Infused Precision is only better if you have not a single kit equipped.

If you’re constantly swapping to the Grenade Kit to use Shrapnel Grenade every 5 seconds, it’s a good choice. And I like it with the FT/EG combo because Flame Jet is a long enough channel to swap to the Elixir Gun and swap back to it without killing your auto-attack.

But when I’m just running the Bomb Kit, either by itself with elixirs/gadgets or with the Tool Kit or Elixir Gun, I don’t really much see the advantage when I’m swapping in and out of it every 5 seconds and ruining my auto-attack.

For what its worth, I feel that these changes are mostly good. The inability to get perma-vigor on demand is in my opinion deserving of change, and any build with crit chance can still get mostly perma-vigor in combat. The incendiary powder change is regrettable, and I don’t especially see why that needed to move to the next tier up. However, accelerant-packed turrets being moved down is great. The buff to armor mods may get me to actually use it now, and the buff to modified ammunition looks wonderful. I’m as of yet undecided on the Transmutation change; it’s gone from a small condition mitigation technique to a mechanic to pay attention to.

Iddiozzia.3489:

I fail to see the point of modified ammo since the only kits that could effectively use a that kind of damage increase are bombs and greandes, which also require 20 to 30 traits in explosive to be “viable”.
Do we have to use 60 trait points to even notice this change? that’s just… stupid.
Move it to adept tier, or just revert the change because except for a few FT lovers that will love this change it just makes no sense in both pve and pvp.

Elixir gun, bleed, vul, weakness ,cripple, poison. 10% damage buff alone. nevermind in party.

flamethrower. bleed, burn. 4% damage buff alone. nevermind in party. (+blind periodically)

toolkit. vul, confuse, cripple, 6% damage buff sol.

It was already a HUGE buff to pistols. moderate for rifles at best. who had rifle mod.
however rifle mod does not effect toolbelt skills. modified ammunition does.

I have said before, and I will say it again. I think ANet is under the impression that Engineers are “balanced” on par with other professions at the moment, and are basing their patches on that fact.

This is incorrect.

Engies are one of the lowest, if not the lowest DPS output profession in PvE, and that fact is overshadowed in part by the condition spam they are capable of at range (while in a bunker build) in PvP situations, and the over-powered position of conditions in game.

While being Jack-of-all-trades, and master of none, Engies are subject to most blanket nerfs in game mechanics, and perma-vigor is just the latest example of that.

Instead of looking at the traits and skills for “build diversity” the devs need to consider “profession diversity” and why certain professions are so under-represented in certain game modes.

Buffing Rangers, which in the recent infographic was listed as one of the most popular professions, while nerfing 2 traits that 90% of engineers take because the other traits aren’t up to par, isn’t a solution, it is a clear misunderstanding of the profession.

30/30/0/10/0 Grenadier

Traveler runes to make up for the loss of Speedy Kits
Infused Precision works in combat to give you vigor
10% Condition Duration from runes + 30% from traits + 40% from food + 20% from double giver weapons = 100%

I’ve rewritten my post for a more clear understanding and less ranting.
It will be split up as all the whole WOT and insight is to long for a single Post.

Edit: They updated the Changelog. Leg Mods is awesome now. Mhm. Have literally no time to really get into it but now i’m more positive for the Moment. And somewhat ok with Perma-Vigor.

(Endgame PvE, sPvP and WvW)

and what would have to be done to make these changes working supporting both Build diversity as well as comparable Damage Builds to other classes when they Build for it.

Let ’s go for the most obvious Selling Point about putting 30 Points in Firearms regardless of the Build first. The change of Modified Ammunition to enable the 2% Damage Increase per Condition for Kits as well.

It ‘s basically a nice addition if it wouldn’t be a Grandmaster Trait in Firearms. Going 30 Points in Firearms is only viable for a Rifle/SD build that take no Kit or only a Single Kit at all due to Static Discharges faulty targeting system that fires off a Bolt in the Direction of where your Camera is aiming if the Toolbelt Skill isn’t automatically aimed (like f. e. the Toolkit ’s Throw Wrench or the Rifle Turrets Static Shot). Well another choice would be a modified Juggermancer-Build

Now I believe that change has been made to both up the Damage for Kits and provide more Build diversity especially when using multiple Kits. In Fact, it does the Opposite and just pushes two viable Builds even more (in terms of Damage at least not Survivability) and works against Build diversity if it ’s staying as a Grandmaster Trait.

Now imagine you would run a competive Maximum Damage Build utilizing Grenade Kit and Bomb Kit which both are in the Top Tier for both Direct as well as for Condition Damage of our class (in different Parts of the Game).

Investing up to 30 Points in Firearms instead of Tools?

Missing out on up to 30% Permanent-Critdamage, +10% Flat Damage Increase that is better controllable by yourself for a single situational based Damage increase.

Investing up to 30 Points in Firearms instead of Alchemy?

No Mightstacking, less HP, less Survivability, less Conditionremoval, less Groupsupport.

Investing up to 30 Points in Firearms instead of Explosives?

300 Power missing, No 3rd Grenade, No vulnerability stacking 10% flat Damage Increase for Explosives Missing, Increased Bomb-AoE missing .

Going 30 Explosive and 30 Firearms !

Now at first sign, that sounds like a good idea and increase in both base Direct Damage as well as base Condition Damage as you’re getting the best from both lines in addition to 300 Power, 300 Precision, 300 Condition Damage and 30% Condition Duration.

So in a list, only Damage-Whise this means …

Positive:

• 2% Flat-Damage Increase per Condition. Maximum Increase of 24%. Which is more of like 10% especially when going against strong Condition Removal or even worse Condition Immunity.
• Higher Precision, Crits More Often
• Higher Base Condition-Damage

Negative:

• 20-30% Less Critdamage
• 20-30% Less Toolbelt CD-Reduction as of that fewer Toolbelt-Usage over Time
• No 10% Flat-Damage-Increase from Tools 25

or

• No Might-Stacking
• No 30% Increased Boonduration
• No 1% DMG-Increase per Boon

If we’re taking into Consideration Non-Damage related Aspects as well
the negative Aspects add up:

• No Endurance Restore on Toolbelt usage
• No Toolkit Recharge at 25% HP
• No 50% Endurance Regen without Vigor

or

• Less Base-HP
• Less Survivability (f. e. Protection Injection -33% DMG)
• Less Conditionremoval (f. e. Elixir 409 Conditionremoval)
• Less Groupsupport (f. e. HGH Mightstacking and Elixir 409 Conditionremoval)
• No Elixir Cooldown-Reduction if you take 1 Elixir

Now you’re left with 10 Points that you’re able to invest. Where should we put that?
Either in Tools for Speedy Kits or in Alchemy for Vigor on Swiftness.

Here the real problem begins to show with that Idea of putting 30 Points into Firearms regardless of the Build!

You’re left with choosing either of both. Swiftness on Vigor OR Swiftness when out of Combat. Either we get reliable Swiftness (finally on a longer Duration yay!) or we get Vigor on Swiftness.

Now you can choose to get Swiftness in Combat, when taking Infused Precision in Combination with Invigorating Speed to get both when doing Damage
But thats only simliar good at first glance.

Lets get to the part about not wanting Engineers to have Permanent Vigor

Firstly, Swiftness is the most usefull out of Combat as the Movementspeed in Combat is 210 u/s while OOC its 300 u/s meaning even with Swiftness you’re at around 20 u/s and slower then someone chasing you that is not even in Combat yet or already resetted himself.

Secondly Vigor that requires one to actually keep in Combat for it to work. The base Endurance Regeneration is at 5% per Second meaning it bascially takes 20 Seconds for a Full Bar if completely empty. With Vigor that is doubled meaning 10% per Second so it takes 10 Seconds for a Full Bar. Meaning you’d have to Crit every 5 Seconds for it to refill constantly.

When is Evade the most usefull? For evading spikes, especially for escaping when you have low HP. After that you want to trigger Vigor for a faster Regeneration. Do you stay still at that point and try to Crit your Enemy every 5s? Certainly not. You can only Evade or Attack. Yes it will still work somewhat, but with a reduced usability, meaning about ~1-2 seconds will be wasted if it ’s even triggering at all if you need to run.

Now toning down Vigor access for other classes like Thiefs and Warrior should be fine. As those HAVE OTHER MEANS TO EVADE OR ESCAPE SOLEY WITH THEIR WEAPON SKILLS OR CLASS MECHANICS. Like for example GS#3 or Shortbow #5.

For Engineers Perma-Vigor from Speedy Kits is one of the CORE workarounds that have been used by many of us as a replacement for those as we don’t have access to simliar evades on our weapons or class mechanics unless we’re taking up utilities for that like Elixir S or Rocket Boots. Which in return reduces our means to bring something else while Thiefs or Warriors still have access to 3 Utilities that they can choose freely from! Not speaking about that they can even bring Movement and Evade-Utilitys that increase their Movement Speed by 25% and Endurance Regenration by 50% that can’t even be stripped like Swiftness or Vigor!

Possible solutions and more details about the changes to our other utilities follow up later, as the above Text has taken so much time that I need to Pause for a bit.

Edit:

Leg Mods seem nice now. At least something done in that direction, I might be fine with the Vigor. Don’t really have time for Theorycrafting thought …

Post Reserved for further Details (Follow-Up)

Post Reserved for further Details (Follow-Up)

@imaginary

Just no. HgH never relied on perma vigor and while I do not find it game-breakingly OP it really is joke to complain about its minor nerf. It is not core and has never been core. No joke.

S/D got a nerf as well so CC will be hitting that build much harder so in the right way a nerf got through strong enough to hurt the now one boon stealing build.

Instead of qqing over the vigor (which was nerfed for traits not pertaining to on crit cross class) perhaps we should address the Incendiary Powder issue.

Re-read the patch notes for each class. Balancing is going to be a hell of a lot more than “My class got hit with a nerf not fair”.

I’ll address that as well later, I’m still not finished and also not QQing about Vigor as I made certain valid points as to how and why other classes are fine without Vigor.

TheGuy.3568:

Re-read the patch notes for each class. Balancing is going to be a hell of a lot more than “My class got hit with a nerf not fair”.

So where did I say “My class got hit with a nerf not fair” ? Again, you better re-read my Explanation and give a resonable response not “My build was always fine without it”. I did even try to incooperate their changes in a new build incooperating their statement / changes and pointing out whats the problem with it in my opinion.

Balancing is going to be a hell of a lot more than “My build is fine”. Right?

And don’t forget it incooperates not only PvE, WvW, sPvP aspects but also the Basics about Build diversity both by investing in the correct Traitlines as well as the ability to switch on the fly between certain usefull Trait-Skills.

No mention of engineer turrets getting the same +71% PvE health as every other minion in the game is extremely disappointing.

TheGuy.3568:

@imaginary

Just no. HgH never relied on perma vigor and while I do not find it game-breakingly OP it really is joke to complain about its minor nerf. It is not core and has never been core. No joke.

S/D got a nerf as well so CC will be hitting that build much harder so in the right way a nerf got through strong enough to hurt the now one boon stealing build.

Instead of qqing over the vigor (which was nerfed for traits not pertaining to on crit cross class) perhaps we should address the Incendiary Powder issue.

Re-read the patch notes for each class. Balancing is going to be a hell of a lot more than “My class got hit with a nerf not fair”.

Can you explain how a 40-50% reduction is a minor nerf?

Tulki.1458:

No mention of engineer turrets getting the same +71% PvE health as every other minion in the game is extremely disappointing.

Lol, man don’t joke. That reads like they’re getting it. Someone might believe that … :-/

Why can’t they give us a couple Gadget traits? I love gadgets!

imaginary.6241:

I’ll address that as well later, I’m still not finished and also not QQing about Vigor as I made certain valid points as to how and why other classes are fine without Vigor.

TheGuy.3568:

Re-read the patch notes for each class. Balancing is going to be a hell of a lot more than “My class got hit with a nerf not fair”.

So where did I say “My class got hit with a nerf not fair” ? Again, you better re-read my Explanation and give a resonable response not “My build was always fine without it”. I did even try to incooperate their changes in a new build incooperating their statement / changes and pointing out whats the problem with it in my opinion.

Balancing is going to be a hell of a lot more than “My build is fine”. Right?

And don’t forget it incooperates not only PvE, WvW, sPvP aspects but also the Basics about Build diversity both by investing in the correct Traitlines as well as the ability to switch on the fly between certain usefull Trait-Skills.

Your main issue is your shortsighted and one sided for instance. PvE is not balanced so do not expect that argument to hold much weight (same with WvW for the most part).

“Now toning down Vigor access for other classes like Thiefs and Warrior should be fine. As those HAVE OTHER MEANS TO EVADE OR ESCAPE SOLEY WITH THEIR WEAPON SKILLS OR CLASS MECHANICS. Like for example GS#3 or Shortbow #5.”

Toolkit, elixir S, toss elixir S, Shield, Sigil of energy, rocket boots, smart use of smoke bomb and finishers, etc. You have quite a few options quit your QQ. BTW nothing you mentioned is class mechanic for thief or warrior.

Like I said in the big picture the vigor is literally minimal and hitting everything that allows it on demand. It really is whining on your part. And if you read my whole post I did say incendiary powder is a viable issue. So save the whole I will beat you with how bad this class is hurting. Read the other classes balancing. The field is about to change drastically. Do not be the guy posting huge QQ without looking at how the entire field is changing.

The sky is not falling.

pheroth.5306:

Can you explain how a 40-50% reduction is a minor nerf?

Because they are doing it cross class.

@theguy

Just leave Imaginary be. I tried explaining a few of the rebalances to him and the fact is he is really just too short sighted he does not even read the patch notes properly so my best advise to you is simply to ignore his ranting.

TheGuy.3568:

Because they are doing it cross class.

Except those other classes have also got other defensive mechanics in their main weapons (especially thieves, with evades) or higher health and armor on top of those in the case of warriors.
In the engineers’ case, there is just the shield – assuming you’re using it.
All the other options require us to use up utility slots (that we must also share with our weapons, still while getting nothing on return for the lack of a second weapon slot). For some survivability other classes can take for granted.
This is a definite nerf for the survivability of the class, it is useless to deny it.

And as always, we’re getting almost nothing in return. Oh, sure, some grandmaster trait no one used got buffed to make it decent (hello, modified ammunitions and armor mods).
Other changes are just a joke – Transmute converts an incoming condition, and just that – it doesn’t do anything to other stacks of that same condition previously applied. And we have no control upon its activation. So if before was just a random chance of getting some stack transmuted every now and then, now we’ll get maybe a couple bleeds transmuted and nothing for the other 15 seconds.
Changing the turret traits is useless too, if they don’t do anything about the turrets themselves.

And saying to see the other classes too is meaningless. Should we compare patches since the game started? Should we see how much warriors got buffed every single time while we were having core traits nerfed to oblivion, kits heavily nerfed and traits reworked to make them useless?
Cause spending 10 points for an additional super elixir is wrong, while a passive, ininterruptable massive regen for free is fine and well, if you’re a warrior. Meh.

Singer.8740:

@theguy

Just leave Imaginary be. I tried explaining a few of the rebalances to him and the fact is he is really just too short sighted he does not even read the patch notes properly so my best advise to you is simply to ignore his ranting.

Did you even read my answer where I said that I was wrong about most parts were your critism was valid (f. e. as in not getting the changes for Warriors / Thiefs properly)?

I never said that it ‘s only those balance changes that are the problem OR only for PvE or only or only. In fact I even tried starting to explain why I think that this will only make things worse (even if it’s not as bad as for other classes yet).

I’m open for criqiue. Just keep discussing, stopping so or ignoring others (aside from random 8 word rants) will never help anyone. @TheGuy.3568: Yes you’re right that we have those, you are also right that some other classes got hit more just by that patch but that just doesn’t make basic problems we have had dissappearing like Jon mentioned above.
Edit:

Thanks for posting here Jon. Bascially it helped to see you’ve future changes for the Firearms line planned. To bad those didn’t make it yet, so I’ll look forward to them.

Well Jon, you mention you guys feel these master traits are underwhelming, so here are some quick thoughts.

Explosive Powder – How about looking at changing the function of this skill a little bit, so that it would add add damage to smoke bomb, glue bomb, flash grenade, and freeze grenade.

Enhance Performance – If you feel this is underwhelming, perhaps make it a group buff?

Power Shoes How making this like several other professions abilities to negate a control effect every 60s-90s. Incoming disabling conditions (stun, daze, knockback, knockdown, sink, float, fear, or launch) are negated by well engineered stabilizing boots.

Elite Supplies I feel this isn’t to bad of a skill. It does need more benefits to give mortar value, but its biggest problem is simplt the other trait option are just to good to take this trait over one of them.

Deadly Mixture Allow this trait to have an added effect to FTs Flame Jet. That is the single worst thing about the FT is that FT does the same damage as the bomb auto attack, but with 3X the cast time.

Potent Elixirs I personally do not find this skill underwhelming at all. We have a vast amount of traits with great benefit to elixirs. But if your looking for idea to add, Perhaps allow this trait to change all the tool belt elixir skills to no longer be ground targeting, but to be AoE buffs off of yourself just like shouts, possibly extend their range?

Packaged Stimulents – I never ever use this skill. At the moment, I cannot even think of a direction to go with this. Tell your guys brainstorming, that I wish them good luck with this one.

Power Wrench I honestly do not feel this is underwhelming at all. The problem here again, is that the traits it compete against often beat it out.

Leg Mods – Doesn’t every profession have something similar to this trait? Do you feel they are underwhelming across the board, or just in relation to the engineer?

Jon, is there a way to get auto attack on grenade kit (skill #1)?

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

Speedy kits 10 sec cd=it only makes it worse vs boon removals not fixing the problem of us having to spam kits nonstop at all. It should be like 5 sec cd 10 sec duration to avoid spam.

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.

At least add something useful in adept explosives, like forceful explosives improving grenade aoe or something.

Transmute nerf=huge hit on ALl engi builds survival once again, the class that has a total of 1 condi cleanse(in heal) without being an HGH.

Buffs to unviable bomb heal or turret specs change nothing as it’s too easy to counter both by avoiding melle or just killing turrets by aoe spam.

Atually super funny to see all engi nerfs considering NO competitive team used an engi in their roster for a very long time now.

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%. It was a massive nerf felt by many but still justified.

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”?

I really hate that many of our traits are just worse versions of other professions traits as well. I understand there are balance reasons for this, but it just irks me. Natural vigor vs. Adrenal Implant being the biggest offender (although this has been somewhat addressed) Dogged March vs Leg Mods, One whole tier down and extra regen! I could go on, but I have other things to say.

I’ll bold the next part as its really the point I want to make
The problem with Engineer traits is that many rely on each other, often not in the lines you want to take. I feel that merging many traits would allow more build diversity and open up options for more unique traits to be added

As a side note who actually uses Autodefense Bomb Dispenser? Or Exploit Weakness, even with the buff?

We don’t want classes to have perma-vigor where dodging is inherent with skill/ reaction. With this being said we looooove classes who can perma stability, perma-evade, and have insaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaane passive healing and/ or other abilities that make life for the player that desires a much more “skill oriented” approach.

Oh my… I’ve confused myself again with the philosophy (lack there of?) of this game.

LOLOLOL I like how there is mention of engineer roles but no mention of what those are, unlike the clear examples for the other classes. Please tell me what they are. I have over 1k hours on engineer, mostly in wvw and I still don’t know what my role there is. Forget tpvp.

Jon, in a premade from WvW (+20 players), What would you say is our role?
Or Anet not even contemplated that game mode?

Honestly I like the speedy kits buff (nerf), now I definietly have a reason to spec into the firearms line for Infused Precision – still basically perma vigor uptime, but now without the extra micro managing involved. The extra precision and condition damage synergizes greatly with the rampager’s set I’m using. I also took a picking up precise sights – if I wasn’t getting 25 stacks of vuln with nades before, I certainly am now.

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.

and as a final note it’s good to see vigor being addressed as it should have been a while ago. Sadly it seems like we are the only class to take such a hit to their vigor trait. The condi engineers main flaw has always been that to do adequate DPS we must make ourselves EXTREMELY squishy and reliant on skillful dodges/blinds to do well. Given the extensive set of nerfs over the last few patches to our survivability I find it very difficult to believe that this decision was made without looking at the insane numbers of dodges that many other classes can dish out without making such a large sacrifice as engis do. I agree that vigor is too strong. I agree that speedy kits and invigorating speed is too strong. But to flagrantly ignore other classes source(s) of evades to such an extent and to nerf engineers survivability further is a not-so-great balance change.

Mesmers and guardians receive something similar to invigorating speed with only five points spent on a minor trait. Rangers receive an insane amount of dodges on their weapon sets, 50% endurance regeneration from a minor trait, 2 seconds of protection post-dodge and very large amounts of vigor from trait selection. Energy sigils are one of the most popular sigils in the game for good reason. Thieves get a minor trait that returns endurance used and the ability to blow a full initiative bar for many more seconds of evade-spam than an engi can dream of.

If all of these things were addressed in conjunction with the change to invigorating speed I would be very happy to take this nerf…

JonPeters.5630:

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.

Imho, almost every engineer uses that because it works with anything, something we can’t say for many of other traits, especially adept ones.
And getting more offense works better than getting defensive traits, anyway – a dead enemy can’t damage you, after all.

JonPeters.5630:

Firearms
We still feel this line is lackluster and in the future some merging and redesigning will take place, but we took the lowest hanging fruit for now. We talked about this line more than any other trait line, but at the end of the day the work and testing required got out of scope for this release. The other spot this line could get a quick pick-me-up is by making at least 2 or 3 of the adept traits in this line good choices.

Imho, we’ve got many traits there that have got mutually exclusive effects.
A trait like hair trigger reduces recharge on rifle, harpoon gun and pistol. Still, you can’t use both a rifle and pistol together. Same for rifled barrels, but at least there is also the elixir gun involved there. Basically, they do many things, but in practice only some of those effects can be used together.
Then there is Coated Bullets. Frankly, it is quite lackluster, mainly because its effects are limited to two skills out of five. Seeing as warriors’ crack shot is getting moved at the first tier, this could be paired along some other adept trait (hair trigger? It would basically end having the same function of crack shot – a reduction in recharge for the main weapon, piercing (with pistols) and a reduction on recharge on the underwater one).
Also, as main weapons, they can’t be compared with kits. Mainly because of their damage reduction because of kits (as explained in last year’s december notes).
Assuming some merging of other trait is done, and a master slot is freed, maybe a trait could be introduced in a master or grandmaster slot that increases damage of pistols or rifle for every non-kit skill slotted. Something like a firearm specialization. And Napalm Specialist could be moved down to master – as a grandmaster trait it is quite lackluster.

JonPeters.5630:

Master tier traits
Some good suggestions on builds that might open up if we improve some of the master tier traits would be good to see. Here is a pretty decent list of master tier traits that I still find underwhelming.

Explosive Powder, Enhance Performance, Power Showes, Elite Supplies, Deadly Mixture, Potent Elixirs, Packaged Stimulents, Power Wrench, Leg Mods.

Explosive Powder: imho, it is just that we’ve also got short fuse competing for that same spot. And, well, we’re talking about direct damage, so basically it affects only the autoattack and toolbelt of bombs/grenades.
Enhance Performance: same as above, basically. You could try giving it some other additional effect (some seconds of fury along with the might for example, or some seconds of quickness if the cooldown is slightly increased maybe).
Power Shoes: as other have said, it could negate a control effect. Or even something more tricky. Something like “you gain 2s stability when disabled, 90s cooldown” would work against burst control, for example.
Deadly Mixture: i see two problems here; first, the trait’s location. Neither elixir gun or flamethrower benefit from the alchemy line, as they give no boon. Thus people probably won’t get 20 points in alchemy just to get this trait, but will rather spend the points on the first line to directly increase damage and condition duration. That brings to the second point: while they’ve got a couple nice direct attacks, the autoattacks are quite lacking on direct damage. If you’ve got to rely on the conditions they deal, you’ll rather benefit from a better condition damage or condition duration…and both of those aren’t given by the alchemy tree. Basically, it would be better in another tree.
Elite Supplies: Imho, the problems here are mostly due to the presence of other interesting traits. And the effect is relatively minor anyway. After all, it affects just the elite skill, thus a little bonus for a skill with a long cooldown (or, in mortar’s case, plagued with other problems).
Potent Elixirs: i didn’t think this would be considered underwhelming. As others have said, maybe change a bit toolbelts when this is slotted?
Packaged Stimulants: i would say it is just that throwing them isn’t that useful anyway. Maybe it could be moved on the adept tier (and kit refinement could be moved at master tier while giving it the old effect).
Power Wrench: well, it partly deals with turrets, and as turrets are broken, there is no reason to take this trait for the effect on turrets. But it isn’t that bad anyway, maybe it is just due of the other traits in the tree.
Leg Mods: imho, it is probably due of the tree it is located in – it is a defensive trait in a tree that doesn’t give strictly defensive stats, after all.

Hey Jon,

Regarding Engi traits, is there any kind of Gadgets Trait that Engis could get? No gadget trait exists currently to make the lesser used gadgets like Utility Goggles or Battering Ram seem appealing.

• I was thinking Power Shoes could be moved into Adept Inventions, and if it must swap with something, Cloaking Device could go to Master. Then, Power Shoes be changed to something like “Cybernetic Enhancements – When activating a gadget, gain 3s of Quickness” (either no or very low ICD).

• The balance of the trait will be that most gadgets have high cooldowns and function on gaining the right positioning to achieve their maximum effectiveness (Rocket Boots, Slick Shoes, Battering Ram). If an Engi chooses to take 2 or 3 gadgets, then that Engi is sacrificing a kit to be a one-trick pony of Burst Damage, or has no key defensive abilities (yeah, 2 stunbreaks, but no kit utility).

• With Inventions on my mind, I’ve always wondered what is the point of Stabilized Armor as a stand-alone trait. I’ve only ever seen it used in conjunction with Protection Injection for 53% less dmg sustained while stunned. Since Protection Injection serves as the passive CC defense for Engi, I propose some sort of functionality change with Stabilized Armor. I’m not quite sure what yet…

Coglin

Deadly Mixture Allow this trait to have an added effect to FTs Flame Jet. That is the single worst thing about the FT is that FT does the same damage as the bomb auto attack, but with 3X the cast time.

• I quite like Coglin’s suggestion for Deadly Mixture here! The sheer slowness of the FT (and the fact Flame Blast/Detonate Blast isn’t a blast finisher…it has blast in its name) is the only reason I don’t use Flamethrower more often! Would it be too imbalanced to grant a similar behavior to Fumigate, like Protection to Self+Allies on cast/tick/or final hit (whichever works best)?

• I’m trying so hard to think up ways to make Firearms better, but the core issue of easily accomplishing any kind of content in GW 2 right now…AoE is too strong. When you want AoE, you go explosives, simple as that. To make Firearms useful, it would have to be given more AoE, which I don’t want, or it would have to be turned into a high-risk, high-reward single target burst line (which it is in some aspects).

• Honestly, I would remove Rifle Mod entirely and merge it with Rifled Barrels. To ensure the messaging of the trait and the functionality isn’t mixed (since Rifle Mod only adds dmg to rifles and harpoon guns), Rifle Mod would apply to Pistols as well. If 10%+range is too strong, then 8% or 5%. Now with an open Master trait, a new, more Valuable Firearms trait can be made. Killing 2 birds with 1 stone, making both a better Adept and Master trait.

• This would create a neat little choice of what the Engineer is trying to gain out of that first (or last) 10 points spent.

Fireforged for Kit Utility builds
Sitting Duck for Control builds
Infused Precision for synergy with Invigorating Speed
New and Improved Rifled Barrels for more Raw Damage/Burst Builds
Hair Trigger for more Utility/Uptime of Firearms Control skills

• Leg Mods is good for WvW, but maybe not 20 points good. Perhaps drop to 10 in Tools, so it becomes a choice between Speedy Kits? The skill choice is – do you plan to run away and not get caught, or do you plan to just quickly shrug off any control? As for the swap, perhaps the almighty Kit Refinement could be taken to Master, with some minor buffs to its effectiveness/numbers to compensate.

That’s all I got right now! Thanks for being so open with us Jon, and good luck with the Colloborative effort!

Malchior – Clint

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…

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

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.

With empowering adreline I don’t like it because I don’t feel that 5% damage increase is worth a trait slot. The rest of the traits compliment builds so much better. I think it would be interesting to combine this with adrenal implant.

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

Regarding Exploit Weakness: it is simply not that useful. If we’re talking about trash mobs, they would die in a couple seconds at max in any case if they’re below 25%. If we’re talking about non-trash mobs, well…some damage would have been more useful anyway, to kill them faster.
Also, assuming you’re in party, there is probably someone fighting in melee range anyway. And in that case, the trait loses any utility.
Regarding Empowering Adrenaline: giving a bonus dependant on the endurance bar means basically forcing people to waste dodges (or to not use them depending on the requirement) to maintain said bonus.
What about something indipendent from adrenaline instead? Dunno, a “spring-loaded punch” launched every X attacks, clearly indicated by a charge counter and a “flashy” animation akin to the personal battering ram, dealing just some direct damage.

I really hate saying things like ‘Jon,’ or whatever at the beginning of a post, but this one is most assuredly aimed at Jon Peters.
This is somewhat off-topic insofar as it’s not covered by the post itself, and is in fact a repetition of a pair of questions I asked is a different thread, and for that I apologize, but:

Jon, I have to ask, because it’s bugging me – what’s up with the asterisk in ‘•Inventions X – Autotool Installation. Increased healing percent from 1% to 5%. * Decreased interval from 10s to 3s?’

Also, are Turrets going to begin scaling to Power? The tooltip numbers are changing where before they would stay the same, and it makes me curious. If they are going to begin scaling to Power, it might be a good idea to mention it, in light of the reductions to Conditions.

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. We have no DS like necro, no godmode stances, no blinks. You nerfed a lot of engi’s defence utis in the past and you keep going in that direction. WHY? engi is really high skill cap class. you cant faceroll keyboard on engi and be viable player like you can do on warriors, necros and other “meta” specs.
PS moving burn on crit to master tier locks people into explosives even more. you cant run 10 30 0 20 10 firearms condi build anymore.

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

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

Remember that traits need to keep pvp and PVE in mind….
Not wvw tho, wvw is the broken spec playground lol. But seriously turrets need a recharge reduction which I think would be perfect on accelerant packed turrets.

They need it tho. Bottom line.

Can we also talk about how reserve mines may be THE WORST trait in all of GW2? Thank you.

Voramoz.6790:

Can we also talk about how reserve mines may be THE WORST trait in all of GW2? Thank you.

ye so many times i was stealthing myself at low hp and those stupid mines reveal me same about “dodge” bomb. i wish i can just turn those traits off.

JonPeters.5630:

Master tier traits
Some good suggestions on builds that might open up if we improve some of the master tier traits would be good to see. Here is a pretty decent list of master tier traits that I still find underwhelming.

Explosive Powder, Enhance Performance, Power Showes, Elite Supplies, Deadly Mixture, Potent Elixirs, Packaged Stimulents, Power Wrench, Leg Mods.

Keep the discussion going and let’s see if we can find some room in those traits to bring those trait lines some more into play.

We won’t be able to address all of the concerns, but we will address the most pressing if we can.

Thanks,

Jon

Jon, I can’t speak for most traits you’ve mentioned here, but I can say that something should be done re: Deadly Mixture.

I think it’s a serious issue that the second-most important trait for Flamethrower Engineers is in the Alchemy tree. Move it to Firearms, thereby bolstering the strength of that tree overall and simultaneously elevating the damage potential of the Flamethrower allowing us to put those 20 points elsewhere (i.e., Explosives).

And though I know this balance patch is mostly related to traits … Really, Flame Jet could use some tweaks. But the issue of its low coefficient compared to other auto-attacks is severely compounded by the fact that Flamethrower Engineers are required to sink 20 points into Alchemy to get the most out of the kit. Is this really ideal? Moving Deadly Mixture to Firearms would go a long way in improving the kit’s damage output.

Hell, maybe even look at doing something like merging Deadly Mixture and Juggernaut together, or merging Deadly Mixture with Fireforged Trigger as a 20% damage increase, 20% skill reduction trait similarly seen with other classes.

And while I may (or may not) have your attention, I really want you guys to re-evaluate how you want Juggernaut to work. For one thing, the passive Might was a good idea. I think it’s a nice damage increase. But now most dungeon groups already know how to hit 25 Vuln 25 Might, and all that passive Might I get from Juggernaut actually does no help for me in elevating the kit’s damage. It’s wasted! Please do something about this.

I hope you take these issues under consideration, because I love the FT/EG combo and is, I think, the purest form of where you’re trying to get the Engineer to be as a jack-of-all-trades.

Just my two cents. All the best.

Anymras.5729:

Jon, I have to ask, because it’s bugging me – what’s up with the asterisk in ‘•Inventions X – Autotool Installation. Increased healing percent from 1% to 5%. * Decreased interval from 10s to 3s?’

I think it is because it isn’t actually 1% at the moment, it just says that on the trait.

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.

Well, in PvE Exploit Weakness isn’t super. The cripple is rarely as useful there as extra damage would be. And even then, it’ll only work on foes below 25% health, when you are probably winning already. There is no risk of the foe getting away, because they just don’t do that in PvE.

Empowering Adrenaline is fairly decent, the damage bonus is quite reliable. But it is also kind of boring in comparison to Incendiary Powder. Seeing burning pop up feels more awesome than randomly getting some more damage. It is also much more interesting to build around Incendiary Powder, or to use it to strengthen other builds. There isn’t much we can do with Empowering Adrenaline to create synergy with other traits/skills/stats. (The only thing I can think of is avoiding endurance regen traits and skills on purpose.)

Purely from a PvE standpoint here.

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.

Firearms
We still feel this line is lackluster and in the future some merging and redesigning will take place, but we took the lowest hanging fruit for now. We talked about this line more than any other trait line, but at the end of the day the work and testing required got out of scope for this release. The other spot this line could get a quick pick-me-up is by making at least 2 or 3 of the adept traits in this line good choices.

Invogorating Speed
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.

Master tier traits
Some good suggestions on builds that might open up if we improve some of the master tier traits would be good to see. Here is a pretty decent list of master tier traits that I still find underwhelming.

Explosive Powder, Enhance Performance, Power Showes, Elite Supplies, Deadly Mixture, Potent Elixirs, Packaged Stimulents, Power Wrench, Leg Mods.

Keep the discussion going and let’s see if we can find some room in those traits to bring those trait lines some more into play.

We won’t be able to address all of the concerns, but we will address the most pressing if we can.

Thanks,

Jon

The balance patch notes made absolutely no mention of turrets aside from a slight buff to a near-useless regeneration skill. Are there any plans to make turrets usable and to fix the bugs that have been around since the beta weekends? These skills take up almost a quarter of the engineer’s utilities.