Guild Wars 2

Okay, English is not my first language so please bear with me.

This is not a call for buff, but rather I think some changes to the flamethrower kit skills are neccessary as most of them are almost never used. I’ve been using flamethrower kit for a while now, and I’ve noticed that skill 2, 3 and 4 are barely used at all. Skill 5 is still useful for its AoE blindness.

For skill 2 (napalm ball), it’s practically useless since the damage it does it about the same as skill 1. It just has a slightly longer range, but casting and recovery time doesn’t seem worth it. If the enemy moves, your blast could miss completely.

Skill 3 (push back effect) often knocks the enemy out just slightly beyond the range of skill 1. It’s not far enough to warrant switching back to a rifle, but yet too far out for the flamethrower’s reach. I suppose it could be used with skill 2, but I use the flamethrower to hit multiple enemies up close. This skill knocks a single enemy back, so while you are hitting the mobs near you, the knocked back enemy is safe from your flamethrower. Or, one could use skill 2 on the knocked back enemy, but the mobs near you are safe from the blast on skill 2. Either way, it puts you in a bad situation.

Skill 4 is a flame wall, which is useful for creating might stacks with blast combos. But like skill 2, the cast time and recovery doesn’t seem worth the use for anything else in combat besides getting might stacks.

Does anybody feel the same, or have some ideas to share?

Skill 2 takes a bit of timing, but since you can detonate it whenever need be I find it isn’t that difficult. The push back is useful if you have a melee enemy to buy yourself some breathing room to close in with the ranged enemy so that way you can burn them down together (also if timed right it is a very short window ranged reflect). Skill 4 is a flame wall that can be used to stack might and proc burn (Flame jet get’s a 10% increase in dmg to burning targets). In order to use the flamethrower you really need to have the traits that lower it’s cd timers and increase it’s damage. Also build for power and crit, not condition damage. It pairs well with the eg since the traits are shared for both ft and eg (and yes the eg is a fantastic power weapon especially acid bomb, which also happens to be an additional blast finisher). All in all I find the FT to be a fantastic weapon kit, it was much improved over when the game first went live just by adding the ability to detonate flame blast. The trick to using flame blast is to let the initial hit happen then detonate it (at level 80 I easily get 6k + out of this attack and it’s on a short cooldown from the traits). Hope this helps, if you have any further ft/eg questions I recommend starting here http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/72009-a-comprehensive-look-at-the-flamethrower-and-elixir-gun/

They used to be good, back in beta! But they were too good and flamethrower engineers ruled PvP (I’m not joking). Since then, if memory serves, literally every skill on the flamethrower has been changed in some way.

And that is why major changes made right at release are generally a bad idea.

Skill 2 is much stronger than skill 1. When I used flamethrower, I used skills 2-5, then switch out because skill 1 is so weak. You’re probably focusing on how big of a number you get instead of how much damage you’re doing. Flame jet gets its entire skill cast added up onscreen, making it seem strong, when in reality you could’ve done more damage with 2 rifle shots and in less time. It also only hits 3 targets, like melee autoattack cleaves, but for much less damage. If it could hit 5 targets, like guardian staff autoattacks, it would be a pretty good attack. Try not to spend too much time using it, unless you’re attacking something with projectile reflect/absorb.

NevirSayDie.6235:

They used to be good, back in beta! But they were too good and flamethrower engineers ruled PvP (I’m not joking). Since then, if memory serves, literally every skill on the flamethrower has been changed in some way.

And that is why major changes made right at release are generally a bad idea.

It has changed considerably, however right now I feel like a standard ft/eg build is more than viable for any game mode. Granted none of the ft’s skills changed this last patch, but the trait changes and the animation changes for rifle’s jump shot as well as the rocket boots change has made me such a stick and move type of player that I can’t really see myself going back to nades. The only time I really would use nades now is if I want to zerg and stand in the back and lob nades and die from retal heh. I guess what I am getting at is, yeah a ft build won’t compare to a nade build in terms of raw damage…but ft is still in a fantastic spot right now and is more than capable of putting out some respectable burst dmg. when using your combos.

It would be awesome if smoke vent was a blast finisher to synergize with napalm or at least if it pulsed rather than a single blind, hell even a bigger radius would be better..

I’m still in the experimental phase with Engineer, but in an HGH build I was able to run an average of 20 might in a fight and didn’t have much trouble at all holding my own, but for me, and this might be a weird complaint that will hold no weight whatsoever in srsface PvP, stacking FT to be powerful kind of robbed the class of the antics that I enjoy running around with my magnet shield, grenades, and gadgets.

Feels too much like a Pyro to me. I mean, I know that’s probably the whole point, but you know. Personal preference.

I use 2 and 4 all the time, and 3 when the situation calls for it. 1 and 5 are bread and butter, but I use all the skills all the time. If you’re not using them, you’re gimping yourself.

I think the Flamethrower is great…pretty much every skill but the auto attack gets used frequently by me. I just recorded a tourny match from tonight, I’ll be uploading it tomorrow…definitely shows how strong the FT skills are. I’ll try to remember to check this thread and add it if its wanted.

The Flamethrower is an utility kit , never forget that BUT however with a mixture you can literally cook ppl if you can control your channel with precision.

I mostly use FT for the toolbelt skill, since it’s kinda difficult to keep burning up at all times with p/s. That said, I do occasionally switch to it and use 2-5. #5 has saved me so many times from eating big hits when i’m down.

What irritates me about flamethrower is that the actual flame skill #1 only applies 1.5 seconds of burning at the end of its skill. Even Hot Air applies 3 seconds and theres not even any flame in that skill. Flame Blast doesn’t give any burning at all. I know you can use the Incendiary Ammo tool belt skill but I don’t want to use a tool belt skill just to achieve what I thought I could do with a flamethrower

I’m a heavy FT user. In Orr, I’ll gather up 2-3 risen at once and dps them with #1, 2 and 4. #3 is situational IMO. When getting jumped by a thief, #5 can make em blow their Backstab if timed right (doesn’t work on pistol thieves). Also, #3 adds another knockback for control engies.

ShadowPuppet.3746:

NevirSayDie.6235:

They used to be good, back in beta! But they were too good and flamethrower engineers ruled PvP (I’m not joking). Since then, if memory serves, literally every skill on the flamethrower has been changed in some way.

And that is why major changes made right at release are generally a bad idea.

It has changed considerably, however right now I feel like a standard ft/eg build is more than viable for any game mode. Granted none of the ft’s skills changed this last patch, but the trait changes and the animation changes for rifle’s jump shot as well as the rocket boots change has made me such a stick and move type of player that I can’t really see myself going back to nades. The only time I really would use nades now is if I want to zerg and stand in the back and lob nades and die from retal heh. I guess what I am getting at is, yeah a ft build won’t compare to a nade build in terms of raw damage…but ft is still in a fantastic spot right now and is more than capable of putting out some respectable burst dmg. when using your combos.

Sorry, I didn’t mean to imply that the flamethrower is bad now. I just meant that the entire kit as we know it was basically created in a couple of patches, and it showed for a while. Over the last year it has definitely been refined.

Mouhappai.5406:

For skill 2 (napalm ball), it’s practically useless since the damage it does it about the same as skill 1. It just has a slightly longer range, but casting and recovery time doesn’t seem worth it. If the enemy moves, your blast could miss completely.

I would have to see your build on this. Your Flame Blast should be totally outclassing Flame Jet. It scales significantly better with Power (and by extension Critical Damage).

You also have to look at both skills mechanically. Flame Blast is a burst damage skill that can hit up to 5 targets. Flame Jet is a channel skill that can hit 3 targets per strike. While you may think that the end result of Flame Jet matches the damage of Flame Blast, Flame Blast strikes more targets quickly—and for more damage.

Mouhappai.5406:

Skill 3 (push back effect) often knocks the enemy out just slightly beyond the range of skill 1. It’s not far enough to warrant switching back to a rifle, but yet too far out for the flamethrower’s reach. I suppose it could be used with skill 2, but I use the flamethrower to hit multiple enemies up close. This skill knocks a single enemy back, so while you are hitting the mobs near you, the knocked back enemy is safe from your flamethrower. Or, one could use skill 2 on the knocked back enemy, but the mobs near you are safe from the blast on skill 2. Either way, it puts you in a bad situation.

This is a skill that seems useless in PvE as a knockback but is totally amazing in PvP. With Fireforged Trigger, it’s a conical knockback (that can hit more than one target). It’s blockable, unlike Throw Mine, but it has no self-CC like Overcharged Shot does. For pesting the mid-point, I really like Air Blast.

In PvE, it’s best used for its projectile reflect, not its knockback.

Mouhappai.5406:

Skill 4 is a flame wall, which is useful for creating might stacks with blast combos. But like skill 2, the cast time and recovery doesn’t seem worth the use for anything else in combat besides getting might stacks.

Napalm is a skill that seems strange until you examine how its mechanics work in comparison to other Fire fields.

It has a 10 second duration, meaning it’s tied with Hallowed Ground as the longest Fire field in the entire game. Unlike a Guardian’s Hallowed Ground, however, Napalm is ground target-able without the need of any traits and has almost one-third the cooldown (80 versus 30).

And because of its long duration, there’s no fumbling around trying to fit in all your Blast finishers in under a few seconds like Fire Bomb.

Mouhappai.5406:

For skill 2 (napalm ball), it’s practically useless since the damage it does it about the same as skill 1. It just has a slightly longer range, but casting and recovery time doesn’t seem worth it. If the enemy moves, your blast could miss completely.

Are you detonating the skill in range of the target? Trick is to let the ball roll through the target then detonate it right after, you’ll get two hits out of it. IIRC it totals 5-6K damage for me on crits.

GL
Blood~

Another neat trick I just recently discovered regarding flame wall and rocket boots, is you can still get area might from simply passing through it on a rocket boot. This allows you (when combined with acid bomb) to quickly disengage and then rocket boot back to the target to re-engage without losing much in terms of dps and still benefit from getting the area might. This is of course if you have space to do so and either miss the acid bomb animation cancel or just simply want to use it instead of a dodge.

I didn’t know you could detonate FT#2. Good to know. AFAIK the tooltip doesn’t state this, would be nice if it did.

But yeah, I recently tried a 0/3/0/3/1 FT/HGH spec and love it.
(forget exact names, going from memory here):
Juggernaut, vuln on crit, and reduced FT skill CD
HGH, either elixir duration or protection on disable, and reduced elixir CD
speedy kits for swiftness or SD for a little extra damage while throwing elixirs for HGH might stacks.