Guild Wars 2

Hey guys,before i go spend golds,i prefer to ask you.
I made some test in PvP lobby,but i don’t see much difference.So i’ll ask you.

Build: Full celestial + assassin ascended rifle + zerker trinkets(or cavalier when in guild raids).

Traits : 6/1/0/0/6

My traits and gear are fine,what i ask for is some tip on runes and sigils.
I actually use runes of the pack + sigil of might + sigil of accuracy.

I was wondering,do i gain more dmg if i go for rune of the eagle(i lose 175 power but i gain 100 ferocity and precision + 6% dmg bonus) + sigil of force(+5% dmg) + sigil of accuracy?

I also need advice on food,to max my nades 2/4/tool belt dmg.
I saw there is a food that give +10% dmg bonus while moving,but it cost 60 silver,so i’m not going to use it.
Is there anyting similar but cheaper?

Or the change is not worth?

full nade dps:
p/p or p/s
rampager / rabid mix with givers weapons or sinister with gives, which looses a great deal of crits
sigil of [doom + torment] or [doom + Bursting]
runes of balthazar or perplexity
6/2/0/4/2
Nades, Toolkit, [Bombs, EG or elixir S]

sorry,i didn’t explain it well,i’m using a dps power build,not conditions.
I play mainly in WvW with my guild or zergs,conditions is useless in that scenario.

why would you run nades then?
retal kills you, regardless if power or not.

if you want to join a raid as engi, you have the option to condi-focus the backline with the build above (the backline has nowhere near as much cleans or retal as the melee-train), s/d zerker, or cleric bomb-healer (your only legit melee-option).

Sure, there are some tanky FT builds, but apart from tagging they can’t do anything.
For roaming (or really small scale) I can understand power-nades, but even there, condi-nades perform better…

Hello frands! Vee Wee here, retired #1 Engi NA and world first rank 80!

Power grenades works great! Grenade Barrage can literally 100-0 certain people with a zerker build and the Magnet > Prybar > Overcharge Shot > Throw Wrench > Net Shot > grenade combo is devastating! If you just zerg around you can run a full Berserker! Vee Wee uses PvE gear in when playing with a giant blob to great effect! Hardly any survivability issues if you position yourself correctly! Power grenades does a lot of damage! If you plan on doing some solo stuff though or if you just have issues surviving, I recommend Hiba’s hybrid WvW build! Hiba is a pretty good Engi who plays at high levels and even won the Tournament of Legends! He uses Knights armor with Celestial accessories! Both damage and sustain are pretty high!

But if you want to keep your current gear, that’s fine as well for zerging! You should use Strength or Hoelbrak Runes to boost your might stacking potential! Grenade Kit does really good power damage, but also does really good condition damage! Stacking might will improve both aspects! With Sigil of Battle you can get a near permanent 9 stacks of might on yourself with Strength/Hoelbreak Runes! You can use Sigil of Fire for your second one! It’s a nice aoe burst that compliments your already powerful AoE damage! Force and Accuracy are pretty meh when facing against other people! There are better sigils out there! If you plan on doing more roaming, Sigil of Intelligence is really good and makes the above combo really nasty!

As for food buffs, use the +40% condi duration one! That’s a given!

Hope that helped! Wahoo! Bye frands!

cavalier is never a good option for engi, knights is always better

MMh,never had problems with retaliation.
Ofc,if ppls mindless spam 11-1-1-1-1-1- on melee train they have retaliation problem.
My skill #1 does 700 dmg,my skill number 2 does 1300 dmg.
So,instead of spam 1-1-1-1-1-,it’s better use #2-#4-#5-granade barriege with a bit of brain.
I do good aoe dmg,i prevent full enemy healing with venom and chill , and i tag a big part of teh enemy.

I’m just intrested to achieve around 1500 direct aoe dmg with skill #2,because now i’m around 1200/1300.

Conditions on backline are not that effective too,especially in guild raids,where if you go on the backline with condition,it takes a lot more seconds to kill the enemy compared to a zerker build.

Static Discharge,it’s too risky,considering the perma-bug on rifle #2 that 80% of the times miss , so the enemy can dodge and aventually avoid the burst.
Also,going with static discharge,i lose the safe distance,and an enemy sniper team can kill me in less than 2 seconds with their mesmers,theives,D/D ele, 3500 range rangers.

I played SD a lot with my sniper team,but the reward is really poor,the risk is too hight,and engineer is not the best class to play sniper team in a guild raid if you have thieves,rangers,mesmers.

So,started to play full power nades and i saw my inventory nearly full of bags(sorry,but tag enemy and loot to have a minum rewards gives some satisfaction) ,i feel more usefull giving continuos aoe pressure on my enemy (with safe distance 1200/1500 range,and by using venom/chill on their refresh/regroups/stacking in the middle of the fight).

Anyway,i’m doing fine with my power build,i just want to know if there is any way to achieve more damage than what i actually do with my runes/sigils/food.
Not considering to go conditions in guild raids/zergs.

Nirvana.8659:

MMh,never had problems with retaliation.
Ofc,if ppls mindless spam 11-1-1-1-1-1- on melee train they have retaliation problem.
My skill #1 does 700 dmg,my skill number 2 does 1300 dmg.
So,instead of spam 1-1-1-1-1-,it’s better use #2-#4-#5-granade barriege with a bit of brain.

Err…
you kinda contradict yourself there.
retaliation applies dmg to you if you hit a retal-buffed target.
it does not matter if you spam 1 or use a propper rota, since each of them are 3 grenades with a 5-target cap. Even tho you will pratically barely reach it, this is a potential 15-hit chain of retal with every grenade-attack. on grenade-barrage that goes up to 35 potential targets.
retal usually hits you between 220-290, so worst case that are 15×290 dmg comming right to your face with every grenade attack, that you can’t dodge, block or avoid with invuln. (it will hit regardless)

the only thing that lets you survive is that nades are a range-based attack, so you don’t get focused with more dmg usually, and have time to heal up. Regardless, your healthbar suddenly behaves like a energy-bar, that goes down with every attack, forces you to pop defensive cd’s more often and decreases your overall effectiveness by a wide margin. Worst case is a random attack hitting you, while your nades are in the air towards the melee-train, since that usually results in inevitable downstate.

Leason learned: never attempt to attack the train with nades. Go for the backline instead, which also suffers from a lack of cleanse, hence condi-nades (which come along with naturally higher survivability anyways).

I cannot find any contradiction, but it’s ok.
Just to make it clear: if you spam nades, 1-1-1-1-2-4-5-1-1-1-1 etc, this is mindless spam, that will make the engineer suffer the reta.
If the engy use his skills with timing, using the most dps/tactical nades, he will suffer the retaliation a lot less, to the point where i don’r even feel it.
I use 2-4-5 and barriage, when i can hit more targets, with timing, or when needed.
I don’t even use the 1….because it does low dmg, and procs useless retaliation in return.
I don’t sit in nades all the time, so the ammount of retaliation i riceve back, is easly manageable for me.
But, when i go in nades, i leave the mark on the group i focus on, that’s sure.
I don’t speak/write a good english,so there should be a miss understanging here, but i can’t see the contradiction in what i wrote. I just say i don t have issues related to enemy retaliation with the use i do of nades.

Anyway, following some tips, ty Ellesee for the input, i made some change, i spent some gold but… i saw GREAT results.
I bought runes of strength, sigil of bloodlust, and the food that gives 200 dmg after you kill an enemy.
During the fight, between runes buff duration, weapon swap, food buff, i was able to achieve 3200 and more power(before the change my power was sitting around 2500/2900 max) .
My avarege hits that were 1200/1300 max, are now in the range of 1500/1700.
That was exactly what i was aiming for… i was not even expexting to see that often an hight damage output, but i hit very often between 1600-1700, and i hit the squishy targets(zerkers) for 2700 too.

I removed sigils of strength some month ago, because i was not playing the role i play now.
They made a great return in my setup especially withbthe bloodlust stack as support.
Also, i made some test with pistol/shield, and the damage output doesn’t change.
Static discharge hitting for 1300…lol…poison dart 4000+,the hightest frag shot was 1800 on a zerker thief,that made my day.

Insanemaniac, that’s true, cavalier are not the best on engy, in my case because they lower too much my crit chance, but with sigil of accuracy and the +125 precision from runes of the pack, that was not a problem.Now that i have no more runes of the pack and sigil of accuracy, with 13% less crit chance, use cavalier is a problem.
Going with knights, would lower a lot my ferocity. I will buy the knights ascended to make some test, i hpe the dps will not go down that much.The alternative is stay with zerker trinkets… that at moment really make me squishy, and i have to carefully position mybself in the battleground.
When there are fight in towers, where you have less space to move and avoid the damage, zerker is a real problem.

Arantheal, i go for conditions when i want to roam mostly.
I don’t dislike conditions, they are the best resource for the engy, but in a guild raid, where the sniper team must focus on one target and kill him few seconds, to avoid an ele from cast meteor/water/static, or an annoing necro etc, power is not only more effective, but more immediate most of the time. Instead of take 10 seconds using conditions, it takes 4 seconds using power(SD for example, that i always used in coordination with my sniper team).
Now, i was bored to play sniper, and feeling more to play another role, like area pressure, not for their backline(our snipers will take care of them) , but for the whole enemy group that have great condi dispell ability.
I well know the potential condi burst we have, but i simply prefer go power atm .
In my inventory, i always have my rabid armor with runes of aristocracy, my pistols, and my shield ready for the use.
But what i was looking for with this thread, was some tip on a pure power setup.
Thanks anyway for your advices,the condi burst is something i try to avoid in guild raids, but i sometimes use it when running with pug zergs in EB, and yes, it works great too 9n enemy back line, it take some more seconds to do the job, but it works, and i’m not squishy as when i run full zerker.

Sorry fornthe wall of text guys, and thanks for the reply.
Problem solved!!!

Celestial isn’t full dps.

Since we are talking wvw I was wondering if bloodlust sigil is worth it vs battle sigil? My other sigil is energy.

battle is more reliable imo

Yea I was thinking that too, it’s just that I wanted to take it slow if I’m going to overwrite the pricey bloodlust sigil. But in the majority of fights that last longer than 9 seconds, you’d typically have 6 stacks of might with battle which is 210 power/condi damage. That seems to beat bloodlust even at its peak with 250 power. And grenade condis tend to be short but rapidly applied so enemy cleansing isn’t too big of an issue.

just make another rifle to give it a shot (PUNLOL). if the one you have is ascended you can put it on a warrior too or something. exotics are cheap. sigils are recoverable from exotics.

Hello frands! Vee Wee here, retired #1 Engi NA and world first rank 80!

Ever since sigils can stack with each other, there’s no reason to run any stat stacking sigil in any PvP scenario! There will always be a better option!

Wahoo! Bye frands!

Using sigil of battle + sigil bloodlust, so i have 250 power and the might stacking.
Wondering how would sigil of strenght + sigil of battle works.
In pvp, testing on dummies i was able to gain 16 stacks of might, but hard to maintain constantly.
Also, considering i gain might from my party(i play in elementalist party), i gain might from the stacking during the fights, i ealsy have 25 stacks or might.
Reaching the might cap, the sigil of bloodlust can help me here, because i can have both, 25 stacks of might250 power from bloodlust.

I tested the build with knight trinkets,and i lose the extra 200-300 damage i do, because i lose the ferocity and also lose some power .
I would like to see the effect on the dps replacing sigil of bloodlust with the sigil that gives ferocity stacks.
250 power vs 250 ferocity, what gives more dps? I suspect ferocity wins.
But…. it requires another test, and another 10-12 golds uff.

ferocity is a very weak stat. power wins hands down.

okay I run a similar build in wvw for my guild as a backline. 62042 with knight’s scholar or knight’s hoelbrak with a mix of zerk/cavalier trinkets. With food the numbers I try to get are 45% crit, 2100-2200 power and just shy of 2700 armor. with wvw/bloodlust stacks and might I get over 3k power.

Bombs will crit for 3-3.5k in this set up which I know you don’t run but they provide enough useful utility for me that I run nades/bombs/elixir s. Since you have full tools you’ll see bigger numbers in your set up.

cavalier armor sucks on engi, switch for something else.. knight, zerk, cele, captain… whatever crit/power/tough combo you like except for cav.