Does the balance team care about engineer?
Um no, it means you need to adjust your understanding of what balancing means. If you haven’t got what you believe is balance after 5 years, it’s because Anet isn’t going to give it to you, not because they need to change how they think.
Engineer doesn’t live in a vacuum, you know. There are other classes to compare against, and they have seen meaningful changes in both the balance patches and expansion.
engineers have seen meaningful changes in both the balance patches and expansion — scrapper got used in the top echelons of the moste importante pvp competitions and was victorious several times (scrapper was meaningful) and was thenceforth relegated to being nerfed just about every major iteration (and youre complaining about it constantly, so the nerfs must have been meaningful)
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Over the last 5 years… Engineer core weapon updates…
Rifle:
Hip Shot – 1 update – 2015 – range increase
Net Shot – 0 updates
Blunderbuss – 5 updates – 2013-2017 – range increase, tooltip update, range increase, PVP damage buff, Condi Buff
Overcharge Shot – 2 updates – 2015 – movement speed no longer adds self-knock distance nerf, range increase
Jump Shot – 8 updates – radius and speed buff, animation bug, vulnerability bug, initial radius * damage buff, tooltip update, movement speed no longer adds distance nerf, range increased, large initial damage nerf and small landing damage buff
Pistol:
Frag Shot – 5 updates – 2014-2017 – skill renamed, rifled barrels bug, bleed duration buff, minor damage buff, bleed duration buff
Poison Dart Volley – 3 updates – 2015-2016 – poison duration buff, poison duration buff, projectile targeting adjusted
Static Shot – 3 updates – 2013-2016 – tooltip update, tooltip bug, confusion and cooldown buff
Blowtorch – 9 updates – 2013-2017 – miss bug, aftercast reduction, tooltip update, tooltip update, rifled barrels bug, untraited double hit bug, burning buff, recharge reduction, burning buff
Glue Shot – 5 updates – 2013-2016 – tooltip update, tooltip update, tooltip bug, projectile speed buff, CC buff and duration bug
Shield:
Magnetic Shield – 1 update – 2014 – can be used while moving
Magnetic Inversion – 1 update – 2013 – tooltip update
Static Shield – 2 updates – 2013-2016 – QOL fix and stun nerf, duration and cooldown buff
Throw Shield – 1 update – 2013 – no longer passes through walls
Most of that is tooltip updates and bug fixes… and the buffs we’ve gotten to them have all been either very minor damage buffs or ultimately affected nothing… and the only real damage buff we got was overturned…
Engineer Turret updates over 5 years…
Universal – 2 updates – 2013-2017 – Utility Turrets auto detonate after 5 minutes, recent overcharge/toolbelt nerf/buff & bug fixes (May)
Healing Turret – 3 updates – 2013-2016 – tooltip update, healing nerf waterfield removal, cast time nerf
Cleansing Burst – 5 updates – 2013-2015 – overcharge buff, combat log bug, tooltip update, trait & healing power bug, the SAME trait bug AGAIN
Regenerating Mist – 2 updates – 2013-2015 – cooldown buff, traited cooldown buff
Flame Turret – 4 updates – 2013-2014 – cooldown reduced and damage arc increased, traited cooldown bug, range increase, tooltip bug
Smokescreen – 3 updates – 2012-2013 – graphic update and duration increase, combo field bug, traited range increase
Throw Napalm – 5 updates – 2013-2015 – cooldown buff, burn buff, combo field added 5and burn nerf, tooltip update, cooldown buff
Net Turret – 6 updates – 2013-2014 – health buff, overcharge bug, tooltip update, overcharge bug, attack rate buff and immobilize nerf, tooltip bug
Electrified Net – 3 updates – 2012-2014 – velocity buff, traited range buff, tooltip update
Net Attack – 2 updates – 2012-2015 – cooldown buff, cooldown buff
Rifle Turret – 3 updates – 2013 – damage buff, traited range buff, tooltip update
Automatic Fire – 5 updates – 2013-2014 – duration buff, damage buff, bleed replaced with vulnerability, Rifled Turret Barrels, overcharge bug and tooltip update
Surprise Shot – 3 updates – 2013-2015 – damage buff, damage buff, cooldown buff
Rocket Turret – 11 updates – 2012-2017 – underwater detonate, cooldown buff, invisible rocket bug, reduced damage bug, range nerf, traited tooltip update, is now an Explosive, remove instant overcharge, tooltip update, the SAME tooltip update AGAIN, tooltip update
Explosive Rocket – 6 updates – 2013-2017 – traited range increase, tooltip update, tooltip update, the SAME tooltip update AGAIN, velocity and targeting buff, tooltip update
Rocket – 6 updates – 2013-2017 – cooldown buff, ground target, target enemy underwater, explosive traits buff, cooldown buff, tooltip buff
Thumper – 2 updates – 2013 – damage buff and cripples, tooltip update
Thump – 3 updates – 2012-2013 – damage buff, tooltip update, Rifled Turret Barrels
Rumble – 2 updates – 2013 – damage and cooldown buff, stun break and stability
Again, a lot of small buffs that were mostly inconsequential, bug fixes, and tooltip updates… and the ones that need work the most havn’t been touched since 2013!!! other than for the recent toolbelt update in May…
Kits… Most of their updates have been universal and kits like Flamethrower have been stupidly balanced to FURTHER reinforce the mindless just spam 1 meta…
Flame Jet has got nothing but buffs while all other Flamethrower skills have been repeatedly nerfed despite them ALWAYS having been inferior to Flame Jet…
Bomb Kit got everything buffed repeatedly INCLUDING it’s overpowered autoattack.
Grenade Kit got the EXACT SAME BUFFS as Bomb Kit
Elixer Gun hasn’t had a single meaningful update since the game launched… nearly all of it’s updates have been to tooltips.
Tool Kit has had practically the same treatment
Med Kit… sure it got reworked to actually have more than Throw Bandages… but the underlying issues with the kit remain COMPLETELY UNCHANGED. The kit STILL heals for next to nothing and is utterly useless as a support kit. Elixer Gun provides better support than Med kit and most of it’s skills are offensive in nature while medkit is PURE SUPPORT!!!
Over 5 years Engineers have gotten a lot of meaningless buffs, a fair share of nerfs, and has problems with weapons and skills that have existed SINCE BEFORE THE GAME EVEN LAUNCHED… So it’s completely logical to conclude that ANet doesn’t care about the Engineer… they were also the last Core class to be added and were rushed even.
Also… one of the devs did state before that they do follow the Meta and balance things accordingly… They try to avoid making sweeping changes that will flip the current meta on it’s head if it can be avoided, but sometimes (like with the massive Condi update) such changes are unavoidable and necessary.
Looking at Engineer we can even see the pattern of following the Meta… Kits have been Meta for Engineer for a long long time (since the game launched in fact). All the changes to Kits have reflected the Meta playstyle, which sadly is “SPAM 1 on Flamethrower, Bomb, & Grenades”… as a result the auto attack on those 3 kits has been repeatedly buffed over the years, the actual skills on flamethrower have been nerfed for no real reason, and the buffs to the rest of the skills on bomb and grenades have been meaningless and overshadowed by their autoattack buffs.
engineers have seen meaningful changes in both the balance patches and expansion — scrapper got used in the top echelons of the moste importante pvp competitions and was victorious several times (scrapper was meaningful) and was thenceforth relegated to being nerfed just about every major iteration (and youre complaining about it constantly, so the nerfs must have been meaningful)
You misunderstood what I said. I never said we haven’t been top tier in something — that’s a strawman argument to use, and it’s mistaking the weather for the climate.
What I’m saying was that meaningful changes include redesigns in functionality. An example is how many warrior traits were reworked to provide more meaning and utility. They’ve taken in-depth analyses of other classes (guardian, warrior, etc) and did their best to improve classes where they felt parts were weak or underutilized. They also tried to work out a lot of bugs, kinks, and irregularities in those classes. Most recently, we’ve seen them attempt this kind of fix with weapon reworks for warrior.
What engineers have seen have generally either been nerfs (turrets, gyros, scrapper) or number tweaks. There has been no critical examination of our broken traits and skills or major attempt to correct our outstanding issues. Rifle is 2+ years broken now, shield is [still] worthless because MH pistol is garbage as a damage dealer, many of our traits are outdated or exist to serve a meta which either hasn’t existed in a long time, or has never existed. Most of our utilities get relegated to the trash heap because kits are so much more useful (more useful than our core weapons too).
Panda documented the individual changes over the 5 years of the game. That they can be summed up so quickly is telling. More importantly, there’s a pattern here — Certain classes are favored by the devs (Warrior, Guardian, Thieves) and others are almost never looked at except when nerfs need to occur (ahem Engineer ahem). We still have outstanding bugs that have been never corrected — Kits interfering with legendary effects, static discharge behaving erratically, and the AI glitchiness surrounding turrets and gyros (stairs being the blast gyro’s worst enemy comes to mind).
TL; DR: At launch, engineer was one of the most versatile classes to play with many options. Since launch, we have gradually been shoehorned into fewer and fewer effective builds, to the point where we have 3-5 effective builds, and almost everything else is total garbage (in PvP, PvE, or WvW). Other classes have seen meaningful revamps and redesigns, whereas the best we got was scrapper, which was designed almost exclusively with with PvP in mind.
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somehow i knew you would move the goalposts.
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somehow i knew you would move the goalposts.
You should probably learn what moving the goalposts means. I’m not asking for evidence or proof and then backing up when that particular requirement is met.
I’m clarifying that you missed my point and presented my argument as a straw man.
WikipediaMoving the goalposts is an informal fallacy in which evidence presented in response to a specific claim is dismissed and some other (often greater) evidence is demanded.
WikipediaA straw man is a common form of argument and is an informal fallacy based on giving the impression of refuting an opponent’s argument, while refuting an argument that was not advanced by that opponent.
(edited by Vagrant.7206)
Um no, it means you need to adjust your understanding of what balancing means. If you haven’t got what you believe is balance after 5 years, it’s because Anet isn’t going to give it to you, not because they need to change how they think.
Engineer doesn’t live in a vacuum, you know. There are other classes to compare against, and they have seen meaningful changes in both the balance patches and expansion.
Sure, go and make all the comparisons you want. Is that relevant to what Anet does? What do you see ingame that convinced you that’s how Anet does things … after 5 years? From what I can tell, those class comparisons have zero to do with how Anet regards any particular class and how it’s changed. If that was the case, we would already have balance between classes close to how you imagine it. To your own admission, that’s not the case.
You suggest the method that Anet uses to balance between classes, yet it conflicts with the reality of class balance in the game. That can’t be right can it?
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It… it can’t be neglect. No dev team would leave a class, especially when there aren’t that many of them, buried six feet under. That simply doesn’t do anyone or anything any good.
Sure, go and make all the comparisons you want. Is that relevant to what Anet does? What do you see ingame that convinced you that’s how Anet does things … after 5 years?
So you worded in this in a weird way, but to answer your questions: Yes, and through observation.
It’s not uncommon wisdom to examine a person’s or company’s motivations by looking at how they treat other people. If someone spends a lot of time and effort making sure that somebody is well taken care of, then that person is probably important to them (the reasons can vary). Likewise, if somebody pays very little attention (or very negative attention) to somebody else, they probably don’t care about that person or feel negatively about them.
And that’s what I’ve observed with class balancing. Warrior has been ArenaNet’s favorite class even since the days of GW1. They spend more time balancing and rebalancing warrior than any other class, suggesting that it is the class they care about the most. There are many possible reasons for this, but I’m not going to presume.
Then you look at engineer, and what we’ve seen have been primarily nerfs. Take a stroll through the forums, and people will sometimes cheer that we don’t get mentioned in balance patches — that’s how common engineer nerfs are. Does that mean they don’t care about engineers at all? No, but their “care” about us is largely antagonistic, if it’s even there.
So when I say they are “apathetic” about our class, I’m giving them the benefit of the doubt. I don’t think they’re trying to screw us over. I think that they’re just not investing the time on the class that they spend for the other classes, and it shows.
You suggest the method that Anet uses to balance between classes, yet it conflicts with the reality of class balance in the game. That can’t be right can it?
I’m not quite clear what you mean by this, could you rephrase?
It… it can’t be neglect. No dev team would leave a class, especially when there aren’t that many of them, buried six feet under. That simply doesn’t do anyone or anything any good.
Alright, what’s your alternative then? I’m seeing apathy, but it could be something else.
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That doesn’t really answer my question: You claim Anet balances classes according to what other classes do, but if that was true, then all the balancing efforts after 5 years should have resulted in … class balance. Clearly that’s not the case and it’s not due to Anet not ‘doing things’. I mean, you haven’t really explained how that works.
If what you say is true, then Engi should be just as good as Warriors because Anet does make changes to both classes. Yet you claim Warriors are good, Engi’s are not. You have a conflicting situation; reality does not match what you claim is how things work.
Let me put it this way: You say favouritism by the Devs on Warrior and Ele is your observation that Anet are balancing to create equivalent performance between all the classes. That makes no sense at all. I can’t imagine at all how favouring specific classes to remain top performers demonstrates that Anet balancing goal is to achieve equivalent performance between the all classes. Favouritism is in fact the opposite of achieving that balance goal.
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somehow i knew you would move the goalposts.
You should probably learn what moving the goalposts means. I’m not asking for evidence or proof and then backing up when that particular requirement is met.
I’m clarifying that you missed my point and presented my argument as a straw man.
WikipediaMoving the goalposts is an informal fallacy in which evidence presented in response to a specific claim is dismissed and some other (often greater) evidence is demanded.
WikipediaA straw man is a common form of argument and is an informal fallacy based on giving the impression of refuting an opponent’s argument, while refuting an argument that was not advanced by that opponent.
lol
you presented the argument:
Engineer doesn’t live in a vacuum, you know. There are other classes to compare against, and they have seen meaningful changes in both the balance patches and expansion.
inferring that engi has not seen meaningful changes in either the balance patches or the expansion as a justification for your flagrant and constant angryposting.
it is so patently obvious that the basis of your argument is wrong that i shouldnt even have to point to the elite spec itself or the nerfs in nearly every balance patch to help you see that making such a broad statement as “engi deserves meaningful changes because other classes have gotten them” is ridiculous and out of touch. engi got its meaningful changes. engi wasnt in a bad place, some of its skills are but engi has always had a place in the metas of all game modes after about 2012 (until the slick shoes nerf that made raiding pointless on engi). in fact, this elite spec was so good at its intended niche that weve had 2 years of nerf after nerf after nerf to the dominant engi pvp build.
so i mean sure you can say “taking away gyro daze” or “adding cast times to gyros” are not meaningful functionality buffs, but that is literally what moving the goalposts is:
Moving the goalposts is an informal fallacy in which evidence presented in response to a specific claim is dismissed and some other (often greater) evidence is demanded. That is, after an attempt has been made to score a goal, the goalposts are moved to exclude the attempt.3 The problem with changing the rules of the game is that the meaning of the end result is changed, too.
stop accusing me of logical fallacies when you dont even know how to wield or avoid them. and stop being so angry.
head here to discuss wvw without fear of infractions
inferring that engi has not seen meaningful changes in either the balance patches or the expansion as a justification for your flagrant and constant angryposting.
it is so patently obvious that the basis of your argument is wrong that i shouldnt even have to point to the elite spec itself or the nerfs in nearly every balance patch to help you see that making such a broad statement as “engi deserves meaningful changes because other classes have gotten them” is ridiculous and out of touch. engi got its meaningful changes. engi wasnt in a bad place, some of its skills are but engi has always had a place in the metas of all game modes after about 2012 (until the slick shoes nerf that made raiding pointless on engi). in fact, this elite spec was so good at its intended niche that weve had 2 years of nerf after nerf after nerf to the dominant engi pvp build.
Engineer has only been in meta due to Kits since launch… every time a build that used utilities besides Kits made it to Meta Status, those utilities got nerfed. It’s like Engineers are not allowed to use anything but Kits… and it’s rather infuriating.
Our meta builds today:
https://metabattle.com/wiki/Engineer
Our meta builds almost a year ago:
https://web.archive.org/web/20160628142642/http://metabattle.com:80/wiki/Engineer
Just give it a look and see how kittening kitten stale our pve builds are…. THEY ARE THE KITTEN SAME.
inferring that engi has not seen meaningful changes in either the balance patches or the expansion as a justification for your flagrant and constant angryposting.
it is so patently obvious that the basis of your argument is wrong that i shouldnt even have to point to the elite spec itself or the nerfs in nearly every balance patch to help you see that making such a broad statement as “engi deserves meaningful changes because other classes have gotten them” is ridiculous and out of touch. engi got its meaningful changes. engi wasnt in a bad place, some of its skills are but engi has always had a place in the metas of all game modes after about 2012 (until the slick shoes nerf that made raiding pointless on engi). in fact, this elite spec was so good at its intended niche that weve had 2 years of nerf after nerf after nerf to the dominant engi pvp build.
You should probably also learn what context means. I pointed out that there have been many negative changes to engineer over time. When I said meaningful, I meant critical analysis from the devs where they rethink a lot of the old/broken/useless things we have and improve their viability.
so i mean sure you can say “taking away gyro daze” or “adding cast times to gyros” are not meaningful functionality buffs, but that is literally what moving the goalposts is:
Moving the goalposts is an informal fallacy in which evidence presented in response to a specific claim is dismissed and some other (often greater) evidence is demanded. That is, after an attempt has been made to score a goal, the goalposts are moved to exclude the attempt.3 The problem with changing the rules of the game is that the meaning of the end result is changed, too.
stop accusing me of logical fallacies when you dont even know how to wield or avoid them.
Just highlighting the things you seem to be missing about what moving the goalpost means. I didn’t ask for evidence, nor did I ask for more, greater evidence. I clarified my post because you seemed to misunderstand it or misrepresent it (the former being a communication error, the latter being a straw man).
and stop being so angry.
And for goodness’ sake, don’t introduce another fallacy.
That doesn’t really answer my question: You claim Anet balances classes according to what other classes do, but if that was true, then all the balancing efforts after 5 years should have resulted in … class balance. Clearly that’s not the case and it’s not due to Anet not ‘doing things’. I mean, you haven’t really explained how that works.
If what you say is true, then Engi should be just as good as Warriors because Anet does make changes to both classes. Yet you claim Warriors are good, Engi’s are not. You have a conflicting situation; reality does not match what you claim is how things work.
Holy cow, where to start with this. I never made the point that ANet hasn’t balanced classes. That’s what they’ve been doing. The meta is currently stable and relatively balanced, and I never made the argument it wasn’t. Don’t misrepresent my position.
What I’ve been arguing is that we’ve been shoehorned into a few very small builds because all our other options have become non-viable. Other classes have experienced revivals and improvements to less-played traits/skills/weapons, and yet we sit here for years asking they make rifle less trash, or gadgets more useful, or traits less randomly thought out.
The latest balance patch highlighted this problem — they decide to make improvements to warrior rifle and axe (both of which saw occasional play in PvP) when I rarely heard warriors calling for it. Meanwhile, engineers have been griping about the state our rifle has been in for years, and we get bupkis.
Let me put it this way: You say favouritism by the Devs on Warrior and Ele is your observation that Anet are balancing to create equivalent performance between all the classes. That makes no sense at all. I can’t imagine at all how favouring specific classes to remain top performers demonstrates that Anet balancing goal is to achieve equivalent performance between the all classes.
Now you’re putting words in my mouth — I didn’t even mention ele! I mainly focused on warrior and guardian, ANet’s two favorite classes.
Favouritism is in fact the opposite of achieving that balance goal.
You’re conflating two ideas which are separate. I specifically said that their favoritism means they spend more effort/attention on a class. It has little to do with keeping a meta balanced.
Here’s an example since you don’t seem to get it:
If I have two children, and treat both (relatively) fairly, it might be reasonable to think I don’t favor one over the other. But it will show in subtle actions — saving that piece of food for the favored child, spending more time with the favored child. Neither child gets denied a good upbringing, but one can still be favored.
Also, this analogy is only good for the purposes of separating favoritism/balance. This is not my position about warrior/engi, just a metaphor to explain why favoritism does not inherently mean imbalance.
Our meta builds today:
https://metabattle.com/wiki/Engineer
Our meta builds almost a year ago:
https://web.archive.org/web/20160628142642/http://metabattle.com:80/wiki/Engineer
Just give it a look and see how kittening kitten stale our pve builds are…. THEY ARE THE KITTEN SAME.
Amen. And notice how our PvP builds have shrunk in that time too.
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What I’ve been arguing is that we’ve been shoehorned into a few very small builds because all our other options have become non-viable.
OK if that’s the case, I don’t see a problem. I mean, you talk like this is exceptional but that’s typical. I don’t think anyone here will disagree that build diversity isn’t a strength of this game. I see that complaint in every class forum … even the ones that are meta. Sure other classes get things here and there … but they still suffer from the same problem if it is indeed a problem to begin with. In fact, I would argue that if you want more balance between classes, you have to accept throwing out build diversity to do it. It’s just too complicated and not within the constraints of the game development resources to do so.
So how does a lack of build diversity for all classes mean that Anet doesn’t care about Engi? Logically, you can say a lack of build diversity means Anet doesn’t care about any class …
What it REALLY sounds like to me is that you just want change for changes sake. I see no compelling reason for that.
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So how does a lack of build diversity for all classes mean that Anet doesn’t care about Engi? Logically, you can say a lack of build diversity means Anet doesn’t care about any class …
What it REALLY sounds like to me is that you just want change for changes sake. I see no compelling reason for that.
I refer to Panda’s point, and the point that has been made many times:
We have been shoehorned into the same builds we have been using for years. Our PvP meta has been virtually the same since HoT launched, and before that, our PvP meta was pretty stagnant as well — I think the flamethrower condi was the meta after our turrets got nerfed to hell (and flamethrower condi still sees some use today, although it’s wimpier thanks to power creep).
As for PvE… we’re still running builds that have been around since launch (after people figured out how to properly build, of course). That’s incredibly stagnant gameplay for engineers.
This is not an argument for change just for change’s sake. But when gameplay remains this stagnant for this long… is it really any wonder when we barely see any engineers outside of PvP? If you want people to play a class, you have to treat it like ANet currently treats warriors.
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Again, there isn’t a problem with having builds that you have been using for many years. I don’t even think that’s true but it’s not worth arguing that point; I have changed my Engi PVE build many time, adjusting to changes (good to bad) that Anet have made to the class. Probably moreso than any other class I play. I don’t doubt the same is true for many others in both PVP and WvW as well, based on the forum chatter.
Changing things just to give people fresh builds isn’t a very good reason to change things, especially if they are trying to maintain other factors. People choose classes to play, not because they expect the class to change and stay fresh every few months, but because they like the theme, or just want to do FOTM. Classes don’t need to be treated like warriors for people to play them. That’s just being sensational.
Besides, even if it is stagnant, the answer to that problem already exists; there are 8 other classes Anet provides players that get bored. That’s the reason they are there.
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Balance? No they don’t have one specific to the Engineer. This is why when the Flamethrower had been a power based kit for the longest got condi buffed and power nerfed. Don’t get me wrong it should have always been condi, fire by it’s very nature should be condi not power based (don’t get me started on the Elementalist). And here lies the first dilemma, the power traits add condi stuff and don’t really add to power as straight forward as other professions. They seem to have a single team, and when changes are implemented the engineer is probably one of the last to see any effort add to that time crunch and they get the short end of the stick by fiat. By comparison all other classes do more damage with rifle skills. Turrets have already been turned into one time use instead of sustained support (which if anyone has the original game guide that was their purpose). You didn’t need amazing weapon damage as turrets would make up for the power vacuum. Now the turret support is minimal to sustained combat, unlike a minion they don’t move, take less damage kill, and don’t heal (the engineer would have to forgo attacking to heal them any, though given their squishy state this appears as a futile mechanic of a long forgotten idea) and take far longer to respawn. Now the engineer has to rely on kits which are so poorly designed for power that it’s actually glaringly bad for power builds. They’re barely a hybrid and this actually makes the kit weaker as a skill selection, but given you don’t get better options for your base weapon to buff combat you’re shoehorned into a counterintuitive profession for power. For condi there is a lot of fluid damage with kits, for power it’s a constant change of kits and belt skills for damage numbers. So what happens when a class mechanic requires a ton of physical interaction vs less interaction, condi takes over as it’s more complimentary to gameplay.
If they really want to fix the power engi they need to add a power based kit, bring the rifle damage up to snuff without requiring kits to make up for a weapon that has no idea what it is. Rifle one is a long range shot, 2 is a net, 3 is an extremely close range shot, 4 is a mid range condi clense, knockdown, and 5 is a leap in close combat attack. So is it a close range weapon or long range weapon? If it’s close range why the long range shot or the net? If it’s long range why the extreme short range shot and the leap attack? If it’s a power weapon why is the one skill the only skill that truly benefits from power? If it’s a condi weapon then the power engineer lacks a base weapon. I’m not including the hammer since it’s a PvP exclusive elite spec so it’s not a base selection without nerfing your class for PVE.
What I’ve been arguing is that we’ve been shoehorned into a few very small builds because all our other options have become non-viable.
OK if that’s the case, I don’t see a problem. I mean, you talk like this is exceptional but that’s typical. I don’t think anyone here will disagree that build diversity isn’t a strength of this game. I see that complaint in every class forum … even the ones that are meta. Sure other classes get things here and there … but they still suffer from the same problem if it is indeed a problem to begin with.
Lack of build diversity IS a major problem… it was a problem for several classes at launch, and all but the Engineer had their initial lack of build diversity resolved by the time HoT went live… Engineers however are STILL shoehorned into mostly the same builds that we were forced into back at the start of the game due to a complete lack of balance within our own skill sets.
Do other classes have certain skills or skill types that are massively underpowered? Yes, but not nearly as many nor do they have anywhere near as large of a power gap. Engineers have 1 skill type that is of value and that is their Kits.. everything else has either been massively underpowered since launch or nerfed into the ground the instant they were strong enough to even be considered a viable alternative to Kits.
Do other classes have weapons that are massively underpowered? No… not really… When it becomes clear that a weapon for any other class is underpowered that weapon gets buffed or reworked to bring it up to par with other weapons from the class. Engineer however do not have this luxury… Because of how limited our weapon selection is and the simple fact that most engineer builds don’t even care what your weapon is beyond being a stat stick, there is a very VERY high likelihood that the number of Engineers using each weapon are almost the same making our weapons look like the most balanced across the board since launch. If every engineer unequipped every weapon but Offhand Pistol and ran with just that for a month, we’d probably see some major Rifle, Shield, an Mainhand Pistol changes finally.
In fact, I would argue that if you want more balance between classes, you have to accept throwing out build diversity to do it. It’s just too complicated and not within the constraints of the game development resources to do so.
You could argue that, but you’d be wrong. It would be easier to balance classes by throwing out build diversity, but it would not be more balanced. It’s entirely possible to get every bit as much balance with build diversity as without, it just takes more effort and critical thinking on the devs part to do so. The result of balancing with build diversity is also better for the game in the long run as well.
When you balance around a lack of build diversity you ultimately end up with a sort of “combat triangle” where class A defeats class B, class B defeats class C, and class C defeats class A. The reason for this is the strengths of one class when focused on a single build leaves a weakness to be exploited by another classes strength, this isn’t inherently bad, infact strength and weakness exploitation like that is good… but, Guildwars was designed with build diversity in mind from the start.
We have options on every class to change our strengths and weaknesses, the only problem is that the lack of proper balance over the past few years has left many of those options unusable. Good balance would allow for players to utilize those options and change the “combat triangle” from being class based to build based, so that say for example Power defeats Tank, Tank defeats Condi, Condi defeats Power. Now instead of always having a clear advantage when facing a specific class, there is the risk of defeat due to them having a build that counters yours. Jack-of-all-trades builds can even be viable options without being overpowered.
Again, there isn’t a problem with having builds that you have been using for many years. I don’t even think that’s true but it’s not worth arguing that point; I have changed my Engi PVE build many time, adjusting to changes (good to bad) that Anet have made to the class. Probably moreso than any other class I play. I don’t doubt the same is true for many others in both PVP and WvW as well, based on the forum chatter.
In how many of those builds have you been using the same Kit? What utilities have you used? How major of changes have your builds actually undergone? You don’t have to answer those questions here, just ask them to yourself and see just how little you’ve actually changed your engineer over the years. I honestly doubt you’ve done much to it in reality, you probably dropped a Utility that got nerfed into the ground in favor of the next best in slot utility, which ultimately didn’t change how your build plays in the long run.
Engineers have had the same few builds since the game launched. When HoT came out we saw a lot of Scrapper builds that died off after Gyro’s got nerfed, and now Scrapper is only seen in PvP, and even then it’s mostly just for the Function Gyro and nothing else since the Core Kit builds are the only real viable builds to Engineer since Launch… We’ve seen a few other builds over the years that all lasted for very very short periods of time before being nerfed into the ground.
Changing things just to give people fresh builds isn’t a very good reason to change things, especially if they are trying to maintain other factors. People choose classes to play, not because they expect the class to change and stay fresh every few months, but because they like the theme, or just want to do FOTM. Classes don’t need to be treated like warriors for people to play them. That’s just being sensational.
Actually, changing things to give people fresh builds IS a good reason to change things. It really goes hand in hand with balance when you take the time to think about it. If people are only using 1 or 2 options out of a dozen or so options, that usually means one of two things, either 1) those 2 options are overperforming and need to be nerfed, or 2) the other options are underperforming and need to be buffed… there is also a third possibility that is usually closer to the truth of the matter though 3) both. So making a change to give people fresh builds is a good reason since it is in and of itself an act of balance.
Besides, even if it is stagnant, the answer to that problem already exists; there are 8 other classes Anet provides players that get bored. That’s the reason they are there.
This is by far the worst and most hypocritical response to the problem. First off lets look at your previous statement:
People choose classes to play, not because they expect the class to change and stay fresh every few months, but because they like the theme, or just want to do FOTM.
So you’re telling me that if I chose Engineer because I liked the theme, but I’m not having fun because the class is stagnant that not only is my only option to change class but that the devs expect me to do so? I’m sorry but I chose Engineer because of it’s theme, I can’t get that theme from any other class… Clearly that is NOT the answer.
If I were picking a class because of FotM then changing classes is something that’d be happening all the time anyways regardless of if the class is stagnant or not. Infact, FotM players generally never even play classes that are stagnant due to them being underpowered. However, in the Engineer’s case they can be very powerful with very little effort, just take Flamethrower, Bomb, or Grenade Kit and spam 1, you’ll do top-tier damage without any effort whatsoever.
And that outlines one of the biggest problems people have with Engineer… Sure we have the most complex build rotations to get our absolute best damage, but at the same time (and has been proven multiple times) we also have the simplest rotations that result in only marginally less damage. We can choose between spamming 1 and doing top-tier damage or playing a finger twisting piano concerto with our skills to do 1% more damage. Not all of our balance problems are because of underpowered skills, our biggest and most glaring balance problem is massively overpowered Kits. Which is probably the very reason we don’t get the buffs to our other skills that we need.
I’ve read what you had to say, but I don’t see Anet doing anything with Engi that makes it unique in any way from how Anet deals with the other classes in this game. The argument that Anet is treating Engis exceptionally in their balancing efforts to justify more change for the class doesn’t make sense because there isn’t anything exceptional going on here. It’s business as usual. You can’t invent the idea that somehow, Engi is some exceptional case. The complaints for Engi (balance, stagnant, etc … ) are just as prevalent for other classes in this game.
For instance, if a lack of build diversity is a problem for you, then why do you even play this game? There is almost no build diversity in the case where you want to achieve top performance for any class and there really never was. These kinds of complaints make no sense because the game simply does not deliver build diversity as a feature based on how it’s mechanics work, even if you believe it’s a problem or not. Just like balancing to the meta isn’t Anet’s goal, it’s as obvious that build diversity isn’t their goal either. Complaining about things the game was not designed to support makes no sense.
(edited by Obtena.7952)
Argue what you want, but Panda nailed our situation.
Problems like lack of build diversity are problems that ANY game with unique flavors (classes), and with multiple paths (roles); are problems that are expected to be fixed from ANY game that wants to follow such philosophy.
If their philosophy is that kits must be an option open to anyone who wants to learn engi, who doesnt have money for the new fancy builds, and therefore it must kept alive all the time, like a stock basic build.
By all means alright, i can go with that, but dont forget we should (and any class should) have the chance to go more further, and people who desire to go further should be able to find a build, as good as the stock one when you compare it apples to apples, but with a different flavor when you play it.
True, stagnant is a problem that any class frecuencies, but dear, tell me the last time the grenade kit (for example) was out of the meta in pve… since my f2p entry to the game to today, i dont remember any moment the grenade kit was a bad or niche option, ever!
Things have been the same so much, that i agree with panda about having a change of winds, even if we are currently peforming well, just for the sake of seeing changes.
(edited by Ivantreil.3092)
I hope that with the introduction of the sword, we will get better as a class and more diverse. Despite kits, it’s the thing that holds the class back- limited weapon choices. The reason why other classes don’t suffer from a lack of build diversity is that they have many weapons to choose from, while the Engi, up until HoT, had 3. The excuse was we get kits, which are another set of weapons that we can utilize. But it’s painfully obvious that we are restricted in build diversity by our lack of weapon choices which forces us to rely heavily on kits. Couple this with the fact that our only weapon swap ability can only be produced from running at least 1 kit and you have a class that begins to be pigeonholed into 1 or 2 types of builds.
The catch-22 then either: nerf kits to promote the use of other utilities = heavily nerf the capabilities of the class
or: buff kits = now the class REALLY has to use kits all the time or else it is shooting itself in the foot by not taking any
Obviously neither situation is desirable. The suitable answer could be to buff other utilities (turrets, elixirs, gadgets, etc.), resulting in indirect nerfs to kits, but nothing as dramatic as a straight up nerf.
Or to introduce another weapon. Taking scrapper allowed us to use gyros, which were at one time great additions and really promoted the idea that running a kit might not be as necessary as before. But then they nerfed gyros, nerfed hammer, all the while buffing other classes.
This is what we are worried about- that when we get good things, they will soon be nerfed to uselessness; that not that many devs play the class as a main and therefore do not understand the problems we suffer, some problems existing from day 1; that other classes get unreasonable concessions and buffs for arbitrary and silly reasons; that the dev team clearly does not understand how to balance classes for spvp and wvw settings.
The last sentence is quite unbelievable since in GW1 there were separate pvp abilities that were not available in pve, and vice versa, since said abilities would be overpowered outside of their respective gamemode. It’s obvious, and sad that these GW2 devs are not building upon the knowledge of their GW1 predecessors.
Argue what you want, but Panda nailed our situation.
Problems like lack of build diversity are problems that ANY game with unique flavors (classes), and with multiple paths (roles); are problems that are expected to be fixed from ANY game that wants to follow such philosophy.
If their philosophy is that kits must be an option open to anyone who wants to learn engi, who doesnt have money for the new fancy builds, and therefore it must kept alive all the time, like a stock basic build.
By all means alright, i can go with that, but dont forget we should (and any class should) have the chance to go more further, and people who desire to go further should be able to find a build, as good as the stock one when you compare it apples to apples, but with a different flavor when you play it.
True, stagnant is a problem that any class frecuencies, but dear, tell me the last time the grenade kit (for example) was out of the meta in pve… since my f2p entry to the game to today, i dont remember any moment the grenade kit was a bad or niche option, ever!
Things have been the same so much, that i agree with panda about having a change of winds, even if we are currently peforming well, just for the sake of seeing changes.
You can agree with that … even I agree that change is good sometimes … and then I remember that I play a game that is a service offered by company that tries to make money for it’s owners. that means that luxuries like ‘fresh’ gameplay and changes just because simply don’t happen, and for good reasons as well.
The catch-22 then either: nerf kits to promote the use of other utilities = heavily nerf the capabilities of the class
or: buff kits = now the class REALLY has to use kits all the time or else it is shooting itself in the foot by not taking any
Honestly, I think the biggest part of the problem is that our primary weapons are so dang weak. If you use at P/P, P/S (hah!), or Rifle and you try to play without a kit, your damage will be absurdly weak compared to other classes. None of these weapons are good, forcing us to use multiple kits, which do have damage that is good (typically bombs and/or grenades).
If they actually want to fix the problem of being stuck using kits, they need to buff our primary weapons to where they are competitive and nerf certain kits to reduce their effectiveness.
You’ll notice that Scrapper in PvP only uses one kit, and that’s because the primary weapon isn’t half bad. Sure, it’s still not on par with some of the more powerful weapons out there, but it’s got some heft to it, and some of the utilities built into it that you would otherwise need a kit for.
(edited by Vagrant.7206)
The catch-22 then either: nerf kits to promote the use of other utilities = heavily nerf the capabilities of the class
or: buff kits = now the class REALLY has to use kits all the time or else it is shooting itself in the foot by not taking anyHonestly, I think the biggest part of the problem is that our primary weapons are so dang weak. If you use at P/P, P/S (hah!), or Rifle and you try to play without a kit, your damage will be absurdly weak compared to other classes. None of these weapons are good, forcing us to use multiple kits, which do have damage that is good (typically bombs and/or grenades).
If they actually want to fix the problem of being stuck using kits, they need to buff our primary weapons to where they are competitive and nerf certain kits to reduce their effectiveness.
You’ll notice that Scrapper in PvP only uses one kit, and that’s because the primary weapon isn’t half bad. Sure, it’s still not on par with some of the more powerful weapons out there, but it’s got some heft to it, and some of the utilities built into it that you would otherwise need a kit for.
You’re right, I should have added “buff weapons we already have” as a viable solution. My bad! But I think that shows my faith in Anet’s willingness to do so is very low and I’m hoping that the next xpac will deliver.