Guild Wars 2

Please post if you agree.

…and are sick of watching the napalm ball phase through enemies (and often out of explosion range).

Of all the Engineer’s issues. This is the one that annoys me most.

The explosion of Flame Blast is a massive part of the Flamethrower’s DPS, worth more damage then an entire cast of Flame Jet. If it were easier to use, all the complaining about FT’s damage would disappear.

You can set it up using FT3 and Rifle4 and Rifle2. Other kits also help to set it up effectively, like Grenade4. I think the skill is fine not being collision based, but I would like it to explode on impact with the environment instead of instantly becoming “Obstructed”. Mobs to close to the wall? Fail. Fighting on ANY hill? Fail. It really makes using the FT difficult in cramped spaces and on uneven ground. But then again, I would almost always rather use bombs in a cramped space, and Grenades are good virtually everywhere, even under water.

Psyfer.8026:

You can set it up using FT3 and Rifle4 and Rifle2.
…
But then again, I would almost always rather use bombs in a cramped space, and Grenades are good virtually everywhere, even under water.

Saying you need to use other skills/kits to set up for it or that other kits more useful only prove that it’s somehow flawed.
Off the top of my head, I can think of no other skills (from any profession) that cannot fulfill their purpose/function independently without also being flawed or underpowered.

Flame Blast is meant to deal damage. It shouldn’t need the help of another skill to accomplish this. If it did, that other skill would have been built into it as a chain-combo.

Psyfer.8026:

but I would like it to explode on impact with the environment instead of instantly becoming “Obstructed”.

Exploding on impact is one of the resulting features to being collision-based.

FT #2 not working right is mostly what makes flamethrower suck.

It’s supposed to be a DPS kit (one of the developers said that specifically during one of the BWEs) however, the damage on #1 is just mediocre at best… and it’s the only reliable damage skill the kit has.

If #2 was also reliable, then it would up the dps of the kit a lot and make it maybe worth using, especially if burn was fixed to not be so terrible in groups (i.e. everyone got their own burn stack).

And yes, you can set the shot up to get it to work most of the time, but the damage is not high enough to be worth the payoff. Having to swap to rifle, netshot, swap back, dodge backwards (and/or use the push skill) just to fire it off… and then miss most or all of an autoattack while you run forward (because the explosion range on #2 is juuuuust out of autoattack range)?

It needs to do 100 blades level damage to be worth that, but sadly it’s not even close.

I would like this aswell. It makes about as much sense for it to pass thru enemies as it does to throw 12 grenades before something dies or fire 30 bullets before it dies or how the cone effects of both FT/EG suddenly stop hitting anything just because the player’s point of view changes even tho the toon turns to hit the enemy or to throw mines down only to have enemies dance all over them not setting a single one off.

My two favorite arguments against common sense returning to the engineering class are:

“what do you know you don’t develop games”

and

“it’s a fantasy game it shouldn’t make sense at all”

people who say that do not play an engineer.

If any of you watch Walking Dead, how much of a change to the show would you see if they had to contend on their weapons with what engineers have to work with? How long would the fight scenes be if they too had to shoot 24-30 bullets to stop just one zombie?

Flame Blast is the most frustrating thing about playing my Engineer, as I use FT a lot. I basically have to pray to the gods, hold my breath, hunt for a four leaf clover, cross my fingers, and rub the belly of Buddha to make sure it hits what I am trying to target. I thought for sure it would have been fixed last patch, and I was pretty annoyed with the lack of FT changes. I’ve played very little since the patch because of this.

As for the Walking Dead reference, it doesn’t hold much weight and has to take game balance into consideration. The closest thing to that would be a FPS game, if that’s what you want your experience to be like; where grenades can one shot you or a couple well placed shots. This game has too many variables and things to consider to make them “realistic”.

Edit: And I forgot my rabbit’s foot, so Flame Blast missed yet again.

I like your idea for it, but I’d like to see it become chain skill that you can activate early if you like. Flame Blast → Detonate Flame Blast.

Amos.8760:

I like your idea for it, but I’d like to see it become chain skill that you can activate early if you like. Flame Blast -> Detonate Flame Blast.

I initially considered this idea, but decided against it because then the skill wouldn’t match the concept anymore.

It would have to be renamed “Flame Bomb” or something.

Giving flame blast a detonate ability would make it cumbersome and time-consuming to use. In a dynamic environment, its too much of a single commitment to focus on tracking and detonating that one skill, so it wouldnt be worth it.

This skill (currently) gets obstructed more often than it hits, which is what makes it frustratingly non-viable. This is what needs to be fixed. Exploding on impact is a great idea and would be ideal, but not necessary for the skill to be viable.

Cheers,