Guild Wars 2

I’m new to the Engineer class (having 3 other characters) and I happened upon a Vudani video. He outlined a dual pistol condition damage with elixirs build. I have heard that it recieved a pretty harsh nerf, and was wondering if it was still viable/competitive. What was the nerf? The only nerf I know about is the internal cool down to the Superior Sigil of Earth.

It still seems fairly effective, but I was wondering if something else is more competitive. If the Skirmishing Alchemist (which is what Vudani called it) is still viable but needs some tweaks, what would they be? Dropping Elixir U in favor of Slick Shoes?

As I said, I’m brand new to the Engineer class, and some advice would really be appreciated. Thank you!

In all honesty, All of our weapons are extremely “viable”. All of our utilities are as well. We still have some broken traits and portions of some kits that have issues, but between the tool belt and utilities themselves, they are all useful.

I have done very well in sPvP with condition focused on my pistol.

Depending on how old the video was, the nerfs in question are stuff like, the bleed duration was halved from 4 to 2 seconds(meaning our bleed damage with pistols was halved) and the explosion AoE with the spam shot no longer bleeds crowds, only the intended target.

Im playing P/P elixirs right now, in PvE though, and im enjoying it personally. Works hilariously well in tight crowds, can’t see the enemies for the amount of damage numbers that pop up. Im not really a PvPer so can’t give you feed back on that side, though i was using a rifle power crit build for my recent galavanting in SPvP

Also running a dual pistols build mostly in WvW and Pve. I’ve also played Rifle and nades but just love pistols too much.
Main problem is to get enough damage output. Even with a condition stuff( like Carrion/Vatlaaw sets ) I have a hardtime to kill people, and i can’t compete with other conditions oriented professions. Add also survivability that is not so great compared to some other profs that do not have to commit to a fight if they don’t want to ( thief/mesmer ).
Imo, aside from fixing the “miss” factor from blowtorch, FT and 3 of EG; pistols also need to get back their 4 secs bleed. Explosive shot, while being fun with Coated bullet on clumped targets, seriously lack in dps for single target use.

As for Elixirs; Instead of U , you should consider R , or a gadget/kit. Depend if pvp/pve. Net turret is also an option.

Concerning sPvp, i kept the Rifle with bombs, elixir S and Personnal battering ram , less fun, but more effective and useful to defend points.

Graywolf.6513:

Depending on how old the video was, the nerfs in question are stuff like, the bleed duration was halved from 4 to 2 seconds(meaning our bleed damage with pistols was halved) and the explosion AoE with the spam shot no longer bleeds crowds, only the intended target.

Im playing P/P elixirs right now, in PvE though, and im enjoying it personally. Works hilariously well in tight crowds, can’t see the enemies for the amount of damage numbers that pop up. Im not really a PvPer so can’t give you feed back on that side, though i was using a rifle power crit build for my recent galavanting in SPvP

So the 1 skill with pistol used to bleed foes with the explosions? That’s awesome (even if it did get nerfed). Thanks for the feedback!

Skaldir.5319:

Also running a dual pistols build mostly in WvW and Pve. I’ve also played Rifle and nades but just love pistols too much.
Main problem is to get enough damage output. Even with a condition stuff( like Carrion/Vatlaaw sets ) I have a hardtime to kill people, and i can’t compete with other conditions oriented professions. Add also survivability that is not so great compared to some other profs that do not have to commit to a fight if they don’t want to ( thief/mesmer ).
Imo, aside from fixing the “miss” factor from blowtorch, FT and 3 of EG; pistols also need to get back their 4 secs bleed. Explosive shot, while being fun with Coated bullet on clumped targets, seriously lack in dps for single target use.

As for Elixirs; Instead of U , you should consider R , or a gadget/kit. Depend if pvp/pve. Net turret is also an option.

Concerning sPvp, i kept the Rifle with bombs, elixir S and Personnal battering ram , less fun, but more effective and useful to defend points.

I’m talking about PvP and the main reason I don’t want to give up elixir U is for the same reason you talked about: not enough damage. That elixir really helps in the damage department. I’m not saying that without U damage sucks (its actually pretty decent) but it just helps a lot. I’m not to sure about the kits because no sigils work on them. It just seems like they’re kinda weak right now. Thanks for the feedback!

Edit:
I still would like to know whether it is considered to be competitive in tournaments. Anything works in hot join

I hear Engineer are really competitive point defenders with bomb kits and stuff.

Really defensive and putting up fields to keep enemies away (they dont have to but no-one wants to stand in the fire) and smoke bomb basicly making the cap a blind zone, bombs healing you with every explosion, sounds like a beautiful thang

I wouldnt say turrets are viable HOWEVER i am a dungeon man myself and turrets die in boss AoE’s and are useless in events where you have to destroy objectives while kiting stuff (AC path 3 i think)

PvP may well be viable, i barely touch it and when i do, im filled with rage at how quickly i drop, then i wonder how bad everyone else must be if im filled with rage yet top of the leaderboards.

Graywolf.6513:

I wouldnt say turrets are viable

I would. As with many abilities and utilities, they are not ideal in all situations all the rime, but for some roles they are extremely viable.

I play at relatively ‘high-tier’ tournie PvP, a proper condition P/P – Bomb kit build is absolutely amazing when fighting on a point. I don’t lose duels to anything but Mesmers (but you know, they are Mesmers) even bunker guardians have to get off the point in under a minute or risk dying.

Absolutely viable if you want to run a point assaulter or duelist, decent on defence as well, but it’s a waste of potential to not send it to pressure a node IMO. For non tournie play it loses effectiveness, as fighting on points is less important and more often than not people just roll as a zerg.

My 2c

I wouldnt say turrets are viable for dungeons =P

I played turreteer once, i had fun, but a boss fight saw them just die and i saw sad until my CD came off.

Also they are pretty crap when you gotta do multiple objectives in different places, but thats obvious.

At this point I only do WvW.

I don’t lose 1v1. I often don’t lose 2v1.

There was only one time that I ran into a player that actually almost downed me 1v1 but it was another PP condition build engineer.

Well Graywolf, it is really not necessary to have to point out that every set of utility skills are not going to be optimal in every situation. I mean control utilities like rocket boots, slick shoes and PBR are all extremely good abilities, but some mobs have counters or buffs that significantly diminish control abilities all together. That doesn’t mean it is logical to discuss how they are not “viable”

Turrets are certainly “viable” ( I love how “viable” has become this new buzz word as of late, especially since it gets used out of the proper context regularly here on the forums) As well you can literally place turrets in locations that they can damage mobs yet mobs can not damage them, at least certain mobs without certain ranged damage.

So my comments are based on pve only since I haven’t gotten around to any pvp yet..

I played a P/P condition build from 1 to 80 and loved it, it was the exact same build that Vudani used in his videos. Once I got to 80 and started having to deal with the risen in Orr I started to see that it kinda took awhile to kill them, granted once they were loaded up with conditions I could just run around and they would die.

Then while grouping I noticed how trash mobs went down so quickly I mean I maybe got a poison volley off and they were dead……so no meaningful dps done and very little loot. Then while grouping I noticed how many condition were on a champ and started reading on limits on conditions and thought that has got to hurt my damage.

I then decided to look at the rifle builds and I came across a video from a guy BigFancyBen.

His Build with commentary – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-iN-iQgJICg&feature=plcp

His pvp reel – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJkTMqJOWvU&feature=plcp

This is pretty much a pvp build but I decided to try it in pve since that what I mainly do. I was pretty impressed with the killing speed and as I added more gear I was more happy with it. Now instead of loading the mob up with conditions and dancing around…..I take a shot with the rifle, hit surprise shot, throw wrench and overcharged shot and they are dead, sometimes I don’t even need the overcharge and just take another rifle shot. The grenades hit really hard as well and sometimes if I get 2 or 3 mobs I will just stand in place and spam the #1 grenade and they all die before I’m at half health.

Anyway spend some silver and grab a bunch of power/pres/crit damage gear and give it a try. I LOVED the condition P/P build but after playing this I’m kinda hooked on the big numbers and quick killing.

@ Everyone:
Thanks for the feedback!

@Ilshenar
I’m mostly concerned about PvP. Thanks for the rifle spec though!

To be frank, I don’t think pure pistols is worth it without at least Grenade Kit or Bomb Kit as a supplementary “swap”. The issues lies with the Pistol Explosive Shot being not so hot. I personally run just Elixir B and then both Grenade Kit and Bomb Kit to supplement my options. I rarely if ever even use Explosive Shot, with 20% reduced cooldowns on Pistols, Grenades, and Bombs. Minimizing that means I’m always using the stronger “cooldown” abilities.

Builds with Elixir S, Elixir B, and Bomb Kit or Grenade Kit are also viable, and I’ve run them before. It’s a bit of a defense vs. offense trade-off there. Bottom line is I think Pistols are great, but you need some kind of extra cooldowns.

My only problem for pistols in zerg play is piercing explosions is either not tagging, or no-one is dropping loot.

And i am recognising that turrets are acceptable elsewhere. when i say they are not viable for boss fights, does that mean i am saying they are not viable anywhere else in the game? I stated from the beginning (well, you can get it from my first point) that my reason for turrets not being viable is the fact they don’t last long at all in dungeons, and that is where the majority of my game time is.

Your problem with my post completely ignored the following statement ’ HOWEVER i am a dungeon man myself and turrets die in boss AoE’s and are useless in events where you have to destroy objectives while kiting stuff’

Hence why i thoroughly believe, anyone who builds into turrets for a dungeon spec, is either experimenting, or got a worm chewing their grey matter. Furthermore, their lack of ability to conquer multiple objectives due to inability to move them and inability to focus fire, makes them unreliable to spec into. I ran into an event where i had to down 3 anti air placements, it was not a group event, and i could have solo’d it, but i couldn’t because i had too many CD’s to wait for and the primary source of my damage was turrets. Therefore, they also are not a good choice for PvE dynamic events as they remove the ability to be dynamic. Now you can raise your hands and say ‘oh that’s a choice you make!’ but the matter of the fact is i failed that event because i couldn’t move fast enough while being at full effectiveness.

So, 2 primary game modes where Turrets will let you down. Dynamic Events and dungeons. They might work wonders in PvP, but turrets are a niche spec and if the battle does not accommodate your niche your basically just an engineer with no utilities. Think about the last encounter for TA story for example, not only will they go down in a single hit from the 4 enemies you have to fight, they also will not focus fire on the enemy your group is trying to burn down, and they will not focus fire on the add that must be killed between each successful enemy down.

There, turrets are foolish to spec into unless you are planning to respec for one event and then respec for the next event which requires you to actually move. They are unreliable in the majority of dungeon boss fights and unreliable in open world combat unless you know completely what events you plan to encounter and you know that none of them require you to do anything but auto attack and AFK, which is basicly all your turrets can do.

Does anyone know when pistol 1 was reduced to .5s cast time?
Just noticed that when doing some testing.

It was .75s about a month ago when I last did my testing.
At that time, p1 also did more damage. it scaled at the same rate as pistol 2 and 3.
Pistol 1’s damage scaling was nerfed a few weeks ago. From .37 to .324.
I don’t think I missed the cast time change at that point. (although, I admit I don’t remember if the cast timer tooltip as added at that point.) My initial testing was done with a stopwatch.

Was this the most recent patch?

I’ll have to re-evaluate where p1 stands at this slightly faster attack rate.