Guild Wars 2

I keep hearing about this mysterious “Jack of all trades” things we engineers can do, but all the builds I’ve seen so far are glass cannon builds and the exact opposite.
Is there a way for us to be able to use any ability, because I can’t even manage to find a stun or daze ability in our entire arsenal of weapons that doesn’t involve also being an iron juggernaut (tool kit, tankcat build i think)

I think I laughed a little bit then died on the inside…

When someone says that engineers are versatile I’d like to think that they’re talking about the class as a whole. Engineers seem to be able to fulfill a lot of specific roles, whether we outperform other classes or not. The way the class has been fashioned up until now, versatility in a single build doesn’t seem to be encouraged.

It seems like the engineering class has been balanced around extremely specific builds. Grenades now do decent damage with grenadier and vulnerability stacking, but without investing at least 25 into explosives they’re not so good. Bombs don’t get good until you get the (Barely adequate) survivability healing-bombs provides, and pistols have been balanced around their grandmaster trait as well. It kills me to look at the investment people make just to stack might for the flamethrower.

The engineer class may look like a Jack of all trades class, but engineers themselves take huge investments into specific traits and utilities to make their builds.

Monsterboy.2490:

I keep hearing about this mysterious “Jack of all trades” things we engineers can do, but all the builds I’ve seen so far are glass cannon builds and the exact opposite.
Is there a way for us to be able to use any ability, because I can’t even manage to find a stun or daze ability in our entire arsenal of weapons that doesn’t involve also being an iron juggernaut (tool kit, tankcat build i think)

So what’s the question exactly? I’m fairly confused.
Also, static shield and throw shield.

really the exact opposite.
Traits are fundamentally designed to force us to focus almost exclusively on one weapon or kit.

We can’t even really do a weapon AND kit. only rifle has strong function without investing heavily into it. Pistol is woefully UP without coated bullets.

Grenades and their damage reduction just made things worse. And is pretty telling the poor thought having gone into it.
Grenade were overly strong due to the traits grenadier, and steel packed explosives.
requiring 25 and 30 points in explosives.
Those two traits represent an about 80% damage increase. An unheard of increase of power with 10 points of trait investment.
Yet, they did not nerf those two traits, to balance grenades. They nerfed the BASE grenade damage value. this now makes using grenades WITHOUT grenadier. not viable. at .33 scaling and only 2 grenades being thrown. .66/throw, at 920 average damage. That is now terrible. Less then rifle 1.

Pistols have this same problem. p1 USED to be 4s bleed, aoe, and .4 scaling.
But because of coated bullets, it was first nerfed to. 4s single target bleed, and .4s. bwe2
Then to 2s single target bleed, and .4s. bwe3. then to 2s single target bleed, and .35 aoe scaling. 1 month post release.
p1 is now AWFUL. EG 1 is more damage. you HAVE to have coated bullets, to bring pistol 1 back up to the average level of any untraited skill.

Flame thrower. Juggernaut, fireforged, and deadly mixtures.
Again, no versatility. the kit is built on at LEAST 30 points in firearms for juggernaut.
The points for fireforged and deadly are also pretty much required. no options. 50 points are basically locked into position.

Picking engi was last minute for me. I played elem mostly in beta. With some mesmer/theif action to give others a shot. but each of those were highly populated in guild, so I wanted to give engi a shot. I had THOUGHT, when I picked engi, that the ability to swap skills would mean exactly that. I could swap skills out of combat, and thus be able to address any situation with the tools needed at the time.
Need heals? EG. Need to ranged nuke. Mortar/grenades. etc.
But due to the way traits work this is not possible. It is MORE possible to swap weapons and utility skills on my MESMER then it is on my engineer. that is silly. Traiting for us, pretty much locks us into the few skills/kits we traited for. Anything else is so woefully underpowered without the complimenting traits, that it is unusable.

seriously, steelpacked and grenadier is nuts. think about it. 2 gren to 3. that is 50% right there, and not just damage. its going from 2 to 3 procs per throw on things that can proc, its 2 to 3 for status effects like chill. 2 5s chills=10s, 3 5s chill is 15s chill. So grenadier is not just 50% damage increase, its 50% total effectiveness increase. AND +range. lol. Steel packed on top of that as well. 1 6s duration stack of vul for each explosive. 3 per grenade throw, with grenadier. 8. EIGHT with grenade barrage with grenadier.

Lets say you are level 80 and have traited to 20 in explosives.
Your grenades will deal 1000 per throw, each.
2000 damage.
10 more points(ignoring the 100 more power)
3000 damage now just from 1 more grenade.
But each throw is also 3% more damage, up to 24% without any addition +cond duration. (.85s throw speed, and 6.6s duration due to +30% cond duration via 30 explosives)
Within 6s you and everyone else attacking your targets, will be dealing 24% more damage into that 24 stacks of vul you applied by yourself.
3720/throw
86% damage increase over 2000. Nevermind the extra damage your allies are doing. or the extra power from the passive.

Nothing comes CLOSE to that kindof powergain for 10 points.
(except for maybe coated bullets double/triple hitting in situations. haha)

Again, what did they adjust? base grenades.

After experimenting with every possible situation and weighting every skill, this is the best I can come up with. I’m quite proud of this build, it’s pretty close to jack of all trades. I use this build for PvE, PvP, and WvW. The only change is the Berserker amulet to Knight amulet when I switch to PvP.

It’s based on the idea that you make almost no mistakes.
http://www.gw2db.com/skills/calc/engineer#14|0|1207|253|4700|4603|4065|30|1422|1789|1885|20|1866|1433|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|20|1883|2270|0|0|0|0|28047|0|49962|49962|49962|49962|49962|25790|21080|0|0|0|0|

I haven’t played around with traits too much nor worried about which runes I’ve got. I ended up with 15/25/30/0/0 during PvE with the idea that I’d do a lot of turrets and rifle. Now I can’t tell you the last time I’ve laid a turret! I started experimenting with different skill combos while restricting trait point changes to see how much performance I can squeeze out of those traits. So far it’s been fun, actually. Different situations call for different solutions which makes it difficult to say, “Here’s the set of skills you need to be a jack of all trades”. I started experimenting like this with elixir gun, elixir B, and elixir S or grenades and that was good for some group supporting play and some WvW. But last night while everyone was taking a bathroom break I tried bombs for the first time. I had bombs and goggles and slick shoes. It was pretty awesome, wiping a mob of 5 ogres plus their pets with bombs all by myself. But what I did with bombs last night wouldn’t work too well in other situations. And to be sure there’s some situations where I wouldn’t try to solo.

I also now carry around a rifle, two pistols, and a shield so that I have access to all those weapon skills, even though I can’t change them in the middle of a fight. I think the key to “jack of all trades” type play is to do something like limit yourself to not changing your traits and then play around with everything else. Looking at the trait lines makes you want to specialize and this kind of build is not a specialist. I also found that if you are not reaching a point where all your skills are on cooldown, you have some underutilized skill that you need to swap out or figure out a better use for.

Has anyone done something yet like try to spread out trait points amongst all traits evenly? I intend to try that when I get bored with my current experiment.

Lite.3819:

After experimenting with every possible situation and weighting every skill, this is the best I can come up with. I’m quite proud of this build, it’s pretty close to jack of all trades. I use this build for PvE, PvP, and WvW. The only change is the Berserker amulet to Knight amulet when I switch to PvP.

It’s based on the idea that you make almost no mistakes.
http://www.gw2db.com/skills/calc/engineer#14|0|1207|253|4700|4603|4065|30|1422|1789|1885|20|1866|1433|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|20|1883|2270|0|0|0|0|28047|0|49962|49962|49962|49962|49962|25790|21080|0|0|0|0|

Very close to what I use myself.
More or less based on the few things that work: Tool Kit, EG’s #5 and grenades for carpet bombing mindless zergs or mindless targets…

Elixir gun mostly for condition remaval, doubled with kit refinement, some healing and an escape.
If I happen to target a single hardhitting enemy, the weakness comes in handy.

Grenades because it’s our only real ranged option…

Tool kit for defense and more melee fun.

I use a pistol and shield myself, and didn’t go 20 in Firearms, instead I went 10 in Alchemy and full 30 in Tools.
Your damage will be better, and the riffle is good cc.

My defense will be slightly better, but in essence it’s the same.

Builds like these are the closest I can find to being ‘versatile’ but frankly: they are a mess and lack in more ways than one…

As Casia explained: engineers lack the traits to create versatile builds that are truely valuable.

I main as an engineer and play both PvE and WvW equally. After hundreds of hours of gameplay and many builds and re-specs, I have come up with a build that allows me to switch out skills to adapt to different situations while retaining high effectiveness.

I always wear Knight’s accessories and Soldier’s armor. I use the Spectral Wave Modulator rifle with a Superior Rune of Blood. I carry a pistol/shield set just in case I need projectile reflections in specific battles.

This is the build I run in WvW:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fcEQFAUl0picX3SiF1LJyoCdGoC6lIF5Xl95BbNfQIA;TkAA2CoomxMjYG7MuZkzMwA
If I’m in a smaller group or running solo, I may swap out Elixir Gun for Elixir C or Elixir S. When fighting near cliffs I would equip Flamethrower instead of Elixir Gun for the additional knockback. In general PvE I may swap out Tool Kit for Elixir C or Bomb Kit, depending on the situation. In dungeons / FotM I swap out Tool Kit for Elixir R (difficult fights) or Elixir C (easier fights).

This build may seem like it’s lacking firepower and/or survivability, but what most people seem to misunderstand about the engineer (and leads them to think the class is UP) is that many of the skills we have available can be used both defensively AND offensively. e.g. Net Shot can be used to stop enemies from running away / dodging, or used to allow team members to avoid boss melee attacks for 2 seconds, or 20% (or 25% traited) of the time WHICH IS HUGE. Freeze and Flash Grenades act similarly, but are also effective on multiple foes, effectively stopping small groups from chasing you or running away. Tool Kit’s Magnet in WvW is almost essential, as you can combine Magnet-Net Shot-Overcharged Shot to completely pull an enemy into your zerg where they get beaten up in seconds. Tool Kit’s Gear Shield is a fantastic 3-second block on a 20-second recharge (untraited). A vital part of this build in WvW is Elixir Gun, especially in large groups. Two AoE heals and two AoE condition removals, along with a pulsing AoE that helps you escape battle, and a bouncing cripple/swiftness shot. Just wow.

TL;DR – Shoot stuff, kill stuff, heal stuff.

Lite.3819:

After experimenting with every possible situation and weighting every skill, this is the best I can come up with. I’m quite proud of this build, it’s pretty close to jack of all trades. I use this build for PvE, PvP, and WvW. The only change is the Berserker amulet to Knight amulet when I switch to PvP.

It’s based on the idea that you make almost no mistakes.
http://www.gw2db.com/skills/calc/engineer#14|0|1207|253|4700|4603|4065|30|1422|1789|1885|20|1866|1433|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|20|1883|2270|0|0|0|0|28047|0|49962|49962|49962|49962|49962|25790|21080|0|0|0|0|

Some of the build didn’t load with that link.

I agree tho we shouldn’t have to play perfectly in order to survive, that last statement you mare resonated loudly with me. “It’s based on the idea that you make almost no mistakes” I’m sure everyone will agree here that other classes have room to make mistakes without being instakilled in pvp or pve.

From what I could actually see from your build it does look interesting. I’d only use EG personally for the traited free healy field but even that doesn’t really heal like it used to. And until they make kits scale with gear and make the healing abilities scale with the +healing properly we’ll still be in beta status.

I’m also seeing a standard theme here. There seems to be this completely ignoring the problems of the pve players in these forums. Just about everyone is posting pvp only or wvw only builds. I think this is part of the problem bigtime. The things you do in pvp because it is such an odd assortment of abilities that work together, you really can’t do in pve and expect anything especially with the nerfs and the miss bugs right now. If we didn’t have to have 300% precision for burst damage or 300% condition damage for pve for it to work properly (when struggling to work around the miss issues and the nerfs) then we’d be better off in pve and could get away with not having to min/max just to keep up. The nerfs per patch for the sake of balancing pvp is killing the versatility of pve with each new patch.

Which PvE problems? I “discovered” elixir gun in PvE while opening Temple of Balthazar and, as totes points out, elixir gun is great for groups. Then after playing a bit WvW and dealing with mobs and trying new skills, I aggro’ed a bunch of Sons of Svanir into a mob in PvE then played them almost WvW style. It was surprising to me that I survived and did rather well considering that previously I’d have handled that situation by trying to exploit the NPC AI and focus on damaging one or two NPCs at a time. I felt like TANKCAT and it opened up a whole new world of playing for me. Point being, play a little of both and you may find PvE problems go away.

For PvE use, I build power and vitality and/or toughness if I need the defense, and I use rifle, med kit, tool kit, elixer B, and rifle turret.

The only really essential thing is the Static Discharge trait.

I like it because of it’s melee and ranged capabilities.

It might not be the best thing ever, but it’s a solid base to a build you can make however you want.

When I think hybrid, my first thing I think of is melee and ranged power at the same time. Sure, you can play rifle and p/p and everything at melee range, and the flamethrower technically is melee ranged (though it’s super bugged) but there’s something about hitting someone with a weapon as opposed to shooting them that makes it feel better.

Again, it’s not the best, but I really enjoy it.

Ever heard the saying “jack of all trades, but master of none”

which can mean that the person knows a little about a lot, but isn’t an expert, and his opinion is not worth much….^^

0/30/0/30/10 rifle+ft+eg+toolkit+elixir b+H, proper traits plus kit refinement if you look most versatile build. Rifle & toolkit for single target and kiting, ft for aoe goodness, eg for support and elixirs to add cream onto cake…

4-6 soldier pieces, rest berserker, runes & sigil for might stacking or whatever you prefer. You should be having unbuffed around 3k attack 45-50% crit 50% crit dam 19-21k hp about 2400 armor w/o juggernaut. You should be running with 12-16 stacks of might pretty constantly and fi you like extra 250 power or prec with sigil abuse.

If you care to drop elixirs to 20 and pick 20 tooks instead you can more freely use static discharge, kit ref and speedy kits without swapping them by need.

winfong.2841:

Ever heard the saying “jack of all trades, but master of none”

which can mean that the person knows a little about a lot, but isn’t an expert, and his opinion is not worth much….^^

Except, just like early wow druids that is the exact opposite of what they are.
I actually played a druid in wow. and yeah.
You had a healing talent tree, a offensive casting talent tree, and a melee tree.
But since you are limited to gear with limited stat allocation, and a limited number of talent points to place into your trees, you HAD to FOCUS your gear and talents into a very specific direction, to be on par at best with everyone else.

Here without a trinity, things are not as bad. But the core issue with engineer traits remains. Our traits have less versatility built into them. there is nothing, “jack of all trades” about the engineer.

Kimbald.2697:

Lite.3819:

After experimenting with every possible situation and weighting every skill, this is the best I can come up with. I’m quite proud of this build, it’s pretty close to jack of all trades. I use this build for PvE, PvP, and WvW. The only change is the Berserker amulet to Knight amulet when I switch to PvP.

It’s based on the idea that you make almost no mistakes.
http://www.gw2db.com/skills/calc/engineer#14|0|1207|253|4700|4603|4065|30|1422|1789|1885|20|1866|1433|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|20|1883|2270|0|0|0|0|28047|0|49962|49962|49962|49962|49962|25790|21080|0|0|0|0|

Very close to what I use myself.
More or less based on the few things that work: Tool Kit, EG’s #5 and grenades for carpet bombing mindless zergs or mindless targets…

Elixir gun mostly for condition remaval, doubled with kit refinement, some healing and an escape.
If I happen to target a single hardhitting enemy, the weakness comes in handy.

Grenades because it’s our only real ranged option…

Tool kit for defense and more melee fun.

I use a pistol and shield myself, and didn’t go 20 in Firearms, instead I went 10 in Alchemy and full 30 in Tools.
Your damage will be better, and the riffle is good cc.

My defense will be slightly better, but in essence it’s the same.

Builds like these are the closest I can find to being ‘versatile’ but frankly: they are a mess and lack in more ways than one…

As Casia explained: engineers lack the traits to create versatile builds that are truely valuable.

I’m more or less using a cross between your builds: 30/0/0/20/20, Rifle.

I’m really considering dropping 10 from Alch, and moving it into Firearms again, because I’ve used P/S forever, and miss it dearly… Plus, condition grenades are so much better than raw power now.

Honestly, it’s just silly that in order to get the most out of grenades, we must not only go 30 into Explosions, but also put points into Firearms now.