Guild Wars 2

Ok I’m a casual player, Mostly solo due to odd hours and limited play time.
I’m working my Engi through the story line.
On Land I like the engineers, underwater they suck kitten poo.

Tips tricks and usefuls wanted.

grenade kit. occasionally swap to harpoon gun for 2 4 and 5. i’ve hit for 30k with scatter mines.

grenades (with grenadier), bombkit, elixir U.

i use bombkit if melee is not too dangerous or when kiting a monster. the attack speed underwater with bombs is REALLY high and the damage really strong. grenades don’t always hit, especially on moving targets, but it’s the best ranged solution. elixir U is the best way increase the damage output. add in Fast-Acting Elixirs if you plan on staying for longer.

avoid underwater combat if possible. its safe to say this game would be dead if underwater combat mattered. its not even in a beta state.

but at least grenades have a real autoattack.

5 and run away

/15chars

What ArrDee said, except I prefer bombs. Yeah I know grenades are targeted underwater which is cool, but they spread too far at range and 90% of the time underwater mobs will be on top of you where bomb kit is better underwater. You can’t reliably land all 3 nades on top of someone like you can on dry ground.

As for the weapon… Harpoon Gun #1 is turrible. Tuuurrrrible. #2 is really good close range (where you likely will be). #3 is weird, the pull is nice but you don’t close any distance and the damage is lower so it’s sort of pointless. #4 is awesome, use it as must as you can. It’s a blast finisher when it detonates. #5 is a nice AOE immobilize that you can do from range as you swim in.

Bomb kit 100%. It fires like a machine gun underwater and pacts a heavy punch. I’ve never felt threatened with it. I’ll go tag 4 – 5 mobs and just kite them (run through them to screw up their attacks too). The other two skills match with my land based skills so I don’t trigger a silly recharge when leaving underwater; however if I know I’m going to be down there for awhile I’ll add riffle and rocket turrets to help out. And what ArrDee said, I switch to the harpoon gun to fire off the timed charge and mines (close range only) for extra dmg on the side.

If it’s WvW however, grenades. Last thing I want to do is close the gap only to find out there’s a zerg about to help him.

Grenade Kit, Bomb Kit, Elixir Gun. If condition based switch for the speargun’s ‘4’ skill once in a while, and that’s it.

regarding wvw:
I can’t count how many times I’ve killed someone from full hp in under 3 seconds underwater. engies have an insane burst underwater that hardly anyone expects. speargun # 4, #3, #2, #2 is the usual attack.
eg#4 at an imobilized target (or downed) is also fun.
eg#1 for that autoattack.
your toolbelt skills don’t share cooldowns between land and water either, so play around with that.
speargun#5 works on land, you can immobilize people on land while underwater.
you can also press 5 too times fast while moving forward and it will leave the net right behind you, imoobilizing anyone following.
chaining #3 speargun into #4 eg will get you a nice distance from anyone chasing.

I love fighting underwater with my engie, it’s so satisfying, being chased by a bunch of guys, turn around and down one before they even know I was attacking them back, literally.

I really enjoy engineer for fighting underwater but if you are just fighting one person and you are a power build
1) Tool Kit’s Magnet
2) Scatter Mines Immediately detonating them
3) Profit

Like others I use a lot of bomb and Grenade kits, but really the answer is any kit. Harpoon gun has a little burst but it is completely useless for sustained damage (imo). Nice control and burst but otherwise just no

Scatter mines can be incredibly insane burst damage, although you need to be relatively close to your opponent or snare them with the net to be really effective with it. It’s on a really short cooldown too.

The auto attack for the harpoon gun is just bad though… way too slow, although it can hit a bit hard.

Elixir gun is also very nice to use underwater.

If you ever do any WvW and get chased by a thief, jump in a body of water if one is nearby. Underwater might as well be lava for some of them.

A common technique is to also shoot and deploy the net immediately upon entering the water. This puts the net right at the water’s entrance, and pursuers are likely to enter at the same place you did and get hit by the net. If you want, you can then turn around and shoot them.

Engie is insanely good underwater.

I swear my Sylvari Engie is half fish by now.

Grenades, even if you are not spec’ed for them, are amazing underwater. Take them and don’t look back.

digitalruse.9085:

Grenades, even if you are not spec’ed for them, are amazing underwater. Take them and don’t look back.

They have this weird thing where they actually explode twice underwater… once midway to their destination, and then once again when they reach it (or hit a wall or whatever on the way there). I don’t know if it’s just an animation glitch or if they actually hit twice or what.

Set them up with a Net Shot from your harpoon gun. Then…

Net Turret (overcharge)
Rifle Turret (Harpoon underwater and borderline OP—overcharge it!)
Grenade Kit (spam everything)

You’ll be shocked at how quickly your opponent drops.

grenade kit + bomb kit + elixir S is all u need maybe add a turret in or something.

For me it’s a case of: How do I underwater when not an engineer.

As others have mentioned, grenade kit is pretty amazing underwater, even when not specced for. With net wall and freeze grenades, you’ll be able to kite anything melee with exceptional ease.

I prefer to use Elixir Gun as my ‘main’ kit underwater, and only switch to harpoon gun to keep #2 on cooldown for the silly amounts of damage with power builds, and use 3 or 5 when applicable.

Don’t dismiss toolkit for power builds either. Net wall, magnet, prybar, scatter mines, and acidic leap will make for a very very dead target, if they don’t have a way to quickly clear the immobilize.

Maskaganda brought up some really useful tips as well!