Guild Wars 2

Recently, the Engineer section of the forums finds itself baffled at how to play the engineer, which does not excel in any particular field of play. With the recent nerf to the grenade’s #1 skill, many people are frustrated with the class. While I understand where that comes from, let’s actually look at the build components for engie as a community. It’s naive to imagine that ArenaNet is reading every other class’ forums except for ours, so let’s give them a productive look of what builds the engineer boils down to, and if it really is so obvious that something is wrong or that we can’t fulfill a unique role very well, ArenaNet will work on it. At the same time, we’ll show that the Engineers in the forums are not full of people whining that they are underpowered (regardless of whether they’re right) but people who still want to show off how a person can play an Engineer and have fun. Sure, feel free to point out when a specific build lacks in certain qualities, but stay constructive and do not resort to turning this into a thread about how terrible the world is now that the primary skill of the grenade kit was nerfed. I want ArenaNet to see this thread and know we want to work with them and help people have fun playing the engineer and getting more people to be interested in the class. Feel free to generalize to any field of play, be it PvE, WvW, or PvP. I’ll edit in insightful comments and give credit.

Tallman (aka Briggs) gives a phenomenal run-down of every individual skill the Engineer has, and their uses in PvP here. I don’t want to overlap too much with his thread so that he gets the credit he deserves for a really good skill analysis.

As I see it, an effective Engineer will take components of more than one build playstyle and combine them for a unique ability to dabble in several styles of play effectively. I consider these build components to be mostly as follows:

• DPS/Support
• Elixir/Buff/Survivability
• Condition/Support
• Control

And hybrids therein. Here’s a look at these aspects. (comment on traits and how you think they fit in as well!)

DPS/Support

• Rifle
• Grenade Kit
• Flamethrower Kit

More engineers than not focus on this component of the Engineer’s playstyle. Grenades naturally are a weapon which does respectable AOE damage at the longest range of regular skills that exist in the game, and is usually the driving force of the build. Note that the 12/14 update nerfed the #1 skill, but left the 2/3/4/5 skills intact and added damage to 3/5. The grenades still offer a strong burst of several conditions and decent damage by using these skills, namely an extreme duration of freeze, poison combo field with great size and duration, blinds, and bleed stacks, all with a relatively large AOE. Because most that use grenades are traited 30 into Explosives for the Grenadier trait (and along with it, vulnerability on each explosion), this means a 50% damage increase on the natural state of the grenades, along with vulnerability on each grenade for a total of 3 per skill (assuming all three explosions hit). With this focus, it no longer stays as viable to sit in the grenade kit and volley grenades endlessly, because the 1 skill is weak enough that switching out of the kit for maintaining damage/control is smart. It is wise to pack a rifle for grenade kits; the great mobility and control of the rifle works very well with them. As of now, it seems like a good idea to switch in and out of the grenade kit for use of its 2-5 grenades . DPS can still very effectively be accomplished with the rifle, so the grenade kit should become slightly more of a damage/AOE utility instead of a kit you try never to switch out of.

Flamethrower kits have a place in DPS largely because of the fantastic Juggernaut trait (30 in Firearms). They have a good knockback for control, a fire field, an instant non-interrupting blind, and damage output through the #1 and #2 skills (albeit skills that have a lot of trouble with targetting). They make a good option but should generally be considered mutually exclusive to grenades. (Can someone who uses the flamethrower comment on whether they think Flamethrower is productive with condition damage, with burns in mind?)

The DPS an engineer produces is still decent, but the engineer is not and never will be suited to 1 on 1 combat. If you focus on DPS, your best play will still always be in supporting your teammates.

Elixirs/Buffs

• Elixirs

Engineers, as was mentioned in the class design philosophy recently, do possess a decent buff-maintaining ability. The Elixirs provide a great amount of status-control and survivability. An engineer focusing on their use of elixirs is certainly likely to focus on survivability and support more than anything, so combining this with the elixir gun or condition damage builds seems wise (I suggest a pistol/shield), to create a play-style of managing your status with giving your enemies a variety of unpredictable conditions and surviving for a long period of time. Elixirs vary between Elixir C which turns all conditions on you into boons, an instant 3-second invulnerability on Elixir S (Tiny stomps are fun!), a stun-breaker and endurance refill on Elixir R, and quickness on Elixir U (Combine with S for tiny super-stomps! Hilarity ensues.).

Conditions/Support

• Pistols
• Elixir Gun

The Elixir Gun naturally fills these roles, and along with it pistols will be your weapon of choice. The Elixir Gun sports a good amount of bleeds and fantastic weakness on its auto-attack, which already effectively reduces enemy damage by 25%. Combine this with its crippling #2, group condition removal / group poisoning on #3, good escape ability #4, and group heal from #5 with additional condition removal via the combo finisher on #1 makes this a good weapon for keeping a bleed/weakness going all while keeping distance between yourself and the enemy and removing conditions like crazy. The dual pistols themselves give bleeds, poisons, confusion, a burn, and cripple/immobilize for the 1-5 skills respectively, to maintain a very good arsenal of conditions on the enemy. The pistol has no movement/escape skills or CC abilities, which is something to keep in mind when selecting the utility skills to go with them.

Control

• Rifle
• Gadgets
• Turrets
• Tool Kit

This aspect of the engineer is largely about CC and movement skills. The rifle is a very solid choice here, whose #2 is an immobilize, #4 is a knockback/escape, and #5 is one of the best movement skills in the game (also fantastic for cheating on jump puzzles!). The Tool Kit is fantastic for control; with a 1200 range pull on #5, a 3-second block on #4, cripple on #2 (and if traited, cripples on 1 and its toolbelt skill!), the Tool Kit keeps constant cripple, is hilarious for pulling back enemies who attempt to escape from you or your group, and keeps you alive with a very good block.

Note: Siofra Crumble makes a compelling case for the pistol/shield being a very strong option in terms of control as well. Because of the ability of static shot to blind several targets, the shield to block projectiles, a double-tap ability for AoE knockback, and a stun on close-range targets from Static Shield.

Gadgets fit right in; Rocket Boots give a great stun-breaker and escape utility with a blast finisher (if you use it in a smoke field, you also get stealthed, so it combos well with a Bomb Kit which packs a smoke field on its #4). Slick Shoes gives a 2-second knockdown to foes behind you, with a toolkit skill to run at double speed for 5 seconds, making it a great escape utility. Personal Battering Ram also features a knockback through blowback, with a cripple on its toolkit skill. Finally, the less-used Throw Mine also features a knockback, which activates on proximity or on manual detonation. Additionally, its toolkit, though creating a mine-field that does damage only, acts as a pseudo-control because player enemies will see red circles on the ground, and often will try to avoid the area entirely.
Turrets also act as control; while in particular this makes one think of the Net Turret (an occasional 3-second immobilize, with two-second stun on the overcharge, plus a toolkit immobilize when the turret is not deployed), turrets in general can act as a distraction for players AND enemies in PvE, and can provide strong control of a limited area. I mention also that the Flamethrower features a 15s cooldown knockback ability which very good.
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These are not solitary builds of their own; they are components that a good Engineer will try to mix and match appropriately. I hope this helps anyone who feels uncertain about what an Engineer does, because the answer is that they do everything to a good degree.
In my own opinion, a person choosing to play an Engineer should prefer playing with a group, as that is where they shine, with an ability to serve any role necessary and assist their teammates. Siofra Crumble points out here that because engineers have pretty good escape and survival skills that, if anything, we’re quite good in solo play.
I think also that Engineers should feel a kinship with Elementalists; they both have tremendous variety of uses, and both have rather high skill ceilings, and if you like one of these two classes I highly recommend you try the other.

I want the Engineer community to get attention for becoming much more constructive with a class that is difficult to make shine. Feel free to link to builds or demonstration videos to demonstrate your ideas!

I think you are not done here, yet I disagree on a couple of things.
This is coming from an engineer who roams WvW solo most of the time, to put this post in context.

The engineer is perfect for solo play. We can sustain ourselves just fine.
We have good survival tools, decent damage and the means to create a good balance between the two without having to go “bunker” or “glass cannon”.
Sure, we are a credit to the team, but saying we should be prepared to run with groups just doesn’t fit.

In terms of control, the reason why I choose engineer, you talk about rifle and how “essential” the rifle is.
Again, in my humble opinion, simply not true.

Combining pistol/shield and the right kits can give you even better and reliable control.

I tried rifle extensively and this is what I learned:
- Net shot has the tendency to miss in PvP situations. The net itself is rather slow.
I have avoided it many times myself without having to use the dodge button.
- Overcharged shot is a single target knockback, but it knocks you back to.
The downside is obvious here, but I’ll give you the escape ability which is pretty nifty.
- Jump shot is neat, but it can be really wonky to use in PvP situations.
It’s fairly easy for enemies to spot it and react accordingly.

Let’s compare to pistol/shield:
- Static shot provides an area blind (the shot bounces between 4 targets)
- Magnetic shield provides reflect.
When doubletapped, magnetic inversion will create an AoE knockback.
- Static shield will provide a stun if you are close enough.
When doubletapped, throw shield provides multiple interrupts and dazes (depending on how good your throw is).

It all comes down to preference in the end, but you can’t deny that pistol/shield boasts a lot of control options that are more reliable then the rifles abilities.

I always have my exotic rifle with me in case I would need it’s abilities, but I prefer pistol/shield by far for the above mentioned reasons.

To each his own, but just don’t say that rifle is “essential” for control based builds, that’s just no true.

Where’s my bombs?

Those are really good points Siofra. I’ve edited them in and given you credit, it’s true that our survivability is actually really good for solo play. I’ve always considered it tougher than other classes because it takes much more work to play solo engineer, but as you point out we can certainly do it very effectively.

Slyfe, I wasn’t sure what to do with bombs, and I’d love to hear what somebody who uses bombs more than I do thinks about their role.

I never noticed my Turrets offering much in the way of a distraction for PvE enemies. Might’ve had something to do with them being crushed in moments, with long cooldowns keeping me from placing them again, or with them just being straight-up ignored by the majority of things. I distinctly remember kiting event bosses through groups of my Turrets (specifically, the Harathi Warlord or whatever it is; can’t remember the name very well), with the boss completely ignoring every other player involved in the battle, and my turrets, to chase me down.

Also: Flame Turret doesn’t have a knockback. It has a Smoke Field overcharge that doubles as a Blind. Thumper turret has a knockback, but it’s on a bit more of a cooldown than fifteen seconds. (I’m a kitten, this section used to claim inaccuracy regarding Flamethrower right here, if anybody is wondering why I’m bothering to say this. That’s right.)

I used to bomb kit for a long time: find melee mobs, run in a circle, laugh maniacally.

I’m an avid bomb kit user, maybe this is useful:

-Standard bomb
Not much to say here. Stuff goes boom.

-Fire bomb
Excellent damage dealing bomb on a relative small recharge.
Leaves a combo field.
Fire aura for leap finisher.
Fire damage for projectile finisher.
Area might for a blast finisher.

- Concussion bomb
Not a bomb you want you just spam.
5 stacks of confusion will get any thief or frenzying warrior of your back.
Combine with static shot and pry bar for maximum effect.

- Smoke bomb
Again, not a bomb you just want to spam.
Handy vs all melee classes trying to beat you down.
Has a slightly larger radius then the other bombs.
Does no damage, but gives AoE blinds per tick and leaves a combo field.
Blindness for projectile finisher.
Stealth for a leap finisher.
Area stealth for a blast finisher.
This is great for passing by large groups of enemies in WvW or just screwing with their head while fighting them.
You can stack the stealth duration the more blast finishers you throw in there.
Big ole bomb, magnetic inversion, blowing up a turret, rocket boots, dropping the supply crate, …

- Glue bomb
Immobilizes and cripples. A great opener for any “bombing run” or something to drop when being chased.
Does no damage.

- Big ole bomb
Has a big radius. Covers about an entire node in sPvP.
Knockbacks enemies and has a blast finisher.
Very handy tool for saving your friends, if you are fast enough.
Say your partner in creating havoc goes down, drop big ol’ bomb next to him and start ressing. Anyone trying to stomp your partner will get knocked back before they can finish the stomp.

Also very handy for stopping players trying to resurrect their friends.
Big ole bomb will even knockback downed players. I don’t think there is any other skill with this ability. (Please correct me if I’m wrong on this one).

You can trait the bombkit for damage via explosives and/or for more defense via inventions.
In my opinion, it’s a great kit that offers a good balance between control, damage and support all combined into one kit.
It will take a decent amount of practice to get the timing on the bombs right, since they all have a small delay and various effects you have to keep in mind.

For maximum effectiveness, keep every combo field in mind to.
Engineers have so much fields and finishers, it would be a shame not to use them.

In terms of roles, that depends on how you trait.
If you go with elixir infused bombs you can really back up your tanky friends in dungeons or even tank yourself. (you’ll need more then bombkit to go full tank).
You can certainly go for big damage with the bombkit to.
In PvP you can really protect a certain area against multiple opponents with the bombkit. (such as nodes in sPvP or keeping them off your gate(s) in WvW)

Hope this helps

Also, @ Anymras, who said the following:

Also: Flamethrower doesn’t have a knockback. It has a Smoke Field overcharge that doubles as a Blind. Thumper turret has a knockback, but it’s on a bit more of a cooldown than fifteen seconds.

See: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Air_Blast

Oh, wait, duh. Somehow thought that was referring to the turrets. My bad. Previous post now amended to acknowledge being a kitten. Meow.