Guild Wars 2

I used to be an Elixir H or nothing guy. I really disliked the Med Kit, and the Turret. Then i found the joy and love in the Med Kit. And now its all i use. I was missing so much with just using H! And now im wondering if im missing out on something with Healing turret? It seems very clunky, and hard to use. Any help/adivce/tips on healing turret?

I don’t really use healing turrets, but it has some pros.

- Good burst healing + AoE Regeneration.
- If you pick it up, it has a really low cooldown.
- F1 reneration + combo field
- Destroy turret used to be a blast finisher, not sure if it’s still the cast.
- Can be used with knockback trait.
- Activate skill remove all conditions, but can have a 10 second delay before cast.

I don’t use it personally because it doesn’t fit in my builds, most of the time I need medkit for speedy kit, or Elixir H for HGH.

Healing turret is great, but it is much less mobile than medkit. If you detonate it about a second after dropping it does an AOE heal. You can do the same thing with a blast finisher like magnetic inversion by using it right after using healing turret’s f1 ability.

If you trait into explosives for accelerant packet turrets, you also get a free knockback every time you heal!

Jester.1236:

I used to be an Elixir H or nothing guy. I really disliked the Med Kit, and the Turret. Then i found the joy and love in the Med Kit.

This is exactly my case. I used to run H without a second thought to Med Kit or Healing Turret. But I finally decided to give the kit a shot, and it fits my playstyle so much better and has the added benefit of reliable Swiftness.

The true power of healing turret lies in “bunker” builds for a few reasons.

1. 15 up inventions puts its overcharge on reset giving it one of the better AoE condi cleanses in the game.

2. Blast finishers in water fields give massive amounts of AoE healing and burst healing, but blast finishers are mainly found in builds that aren’t designed, or aren’t as good at, killing things.

3. Perma AoE regen that can tick up to 300 per second for the entire time with lots of healing power.

It’s an amazing heal, but sadly it’s not that great in a lot of builds. Most damage based builds should choose either med kit or HgH.

I traited my healing turret to give 3 stacks of might for 15 seconds along with the pushback. I never use the condition cleanse overcharge because it takes forever to work. I just drop it and detonate every time. The water field detonate is great for healing in group battles and knockback for fighting against melee that come too close. The damage on detonate is pretty decent with at least 1200 damage on level 80s.

Like you, I used Elixir H without a 2nd thought to the other options. I’ve been using Healing Turret now lately inopen world leveling and it’s been pretty nice. Drop it before I pull and it’s constant regen throughout a fight. Need a burst? Overcharge it.

I still haven’t figured out how to use Med Kit when leveling solo. I’m sure it’s great for group play, but alone I don’t really get it. Do I drop it before the fight or what? Just seems to take too long to use heal. Or do I use its F1 for an immediate heal?

Ever since the fix to the Healing Turret in February, I’ve used it almost exclusively in PvE group situations except for CoF. Learn to time the Water field with detonating it and you’ll never want to go back. It helps if you have the “combat circles” graphic options enabled because the game will display a white circle for Combo fields knowing when to detonate it. Just practice in Lion’s Arch and you’ll get the hang of it quickly.

Plus…

Cleansing Burst (Overcharge) = AoE Full Condition Cleanse
Regenerating Mist + Magnetic Shield = Regeneration + AoE Heal

But I use the Med Kit in CoF and solo situations for self-heals and buffs (Fury + Swiftness, 3K+ healing on a 12-second CD).

Never understood the fascination surrounding Elixir H. I always felt like it was the worst of the three.

@Seras.5702

Use F1.

Med kit is really awesome if you have at least 15 points in Tool.

Lower cooldown and it reset at 25% hp. Saved my kitten countless of time.

I just use the med pack when I have to retreat.

Phineas Poe.3018:

Ever since the fix to the Healing Turret in February, I’ve used it almost exclusively in PvE group situations except for CoF. Learn to time the Water field with detonating it and you’ll never want to go back. It helps if you have the “red circles” graphic options enabled because the game will display a white circle for Combo fields knowing when to detonate it. Plus…

Cleansing Burst (Overcharge) = AoE Full Condition Cleanse
Regenerating Mist + Magnetic Shield = Regeneration + AoE Heal

But I use the Med Kit in CoF and solo situations for self-heals and buffs (Fury + Swiftness, 3K+ healing on a 12-second CD).

Never understood the fascination surrounding Elixir H. I always felt like it was the worst of the three.

Elixir H is mostly used for HGH/formula 409 build.

Kardiamond.6952:

@Seras.5702

Use F1.

Med kit is really awesome if you have at least 15 points in Tool.

Lower cooldown and it reset at 25% hp. Saved my kitten countless of time.

I just use the med pack when I have to retreat.

So Med Kit is only good because of the toolbelt skill? I run with FT/EG so I don’t need the medkit swap for swiftness. Does anyone actually use the MedKit skills?

Seras.5702:

I still haven’t figured out how to use Med Kit when leveling solo. I’m sure it’s great for group play, but alone I don’t really get it. Do I drop it before the fight or what? Just seems to take too long to use heal. Or do I use its F1 for an immediate heal?

My PvE build (open world) is a rifle/rifle turret build. Against anything more dangerous than the average trash mob I “prep” the battlefield with Throw Mine, Mine Field, and the Med Kit bags before dropping my turret and firing off Net Shot. I then use Med Kit’s toolbelt skill as I wound any other healing skill.

Seras.5702:

Kardiamond.6952:

@Seras.5702

Use F1.

Med kit is really awesome if you have at least 15 points in Tool.

Lower cooldown and it reset at 25% hp. Saved my kitten countless of time.

I just use the med pack when I have to retreat.

So Med Kit is only good because of the toolbelt skill? I run with FT/EG so I don’t need the medkit swap for swiftness. Does anyone actually use the MedKit skills?

No, medkit ability are useful.

You can start a fight with fury, which is awesome.

And med pack are a live saver when heal are on cooldown and you need 3k+ hp.

So rely on the toolbelt of MedKit for heals. Swap n’ Drop fast for bonus heals on main-heal CD and use #5 for fury. Got it. It seems it’s best used pre-fight.

Yeah, I didn’t PvE for weeks so I can’t say more about it.

Kardiamond.6952:

Elixir H is mostly used for HGH/formula 409 build.

So you have to fill up your Alchemy tree with traits specified for it that the Med Kit does just fine naturally (and with no points in Tools).

Drop Antidote removes one condition on a 15 second cooldown—4 removed per minute. Comparatively, having taken Fast-Acting Elixirs you get 5 conditions removed per minute (3 from Elixir H, 2 from Toss).

You get only one less removed condition going with the Med Kit, and it requires no traits to do so (and traits are the only way Elixir H outperforms it). Though Fast-Acting Elixirs is a trait a lot of people take, even those that don’t use Elixir H, it’s something to keep in mind. But I think the Med Kit outperforms Elixir H in every other area.

Now, Elixir H itself can be drank every 20 seconds and has a chance to give Regeneration. 5560 + Regeneration does outperform 4920 raw healing from Bandage Self…

….Until you compare everything else the Med Kit has to Elixir H.

Med Kit has 3x Drop Bandages that heal for 1K each—far more than Regeneration does with Toss Elixir H—and on 12 second cooldowns. For every 30 seconds of Toss Elixir H that may give you 1300 health from Regeneration, you will have healed yourself for 6K. No RNG, and more health back.

Further more, Drop Stimulant will always give base 10 seconds of Fury and Swiftness. Every time you drop it. No RNG.

So I don’t know about you, but I’d rather take Fury (perma with 6/6 Altruism runes) and its +20% critical hit chance over another 70-105 Power.

In a group situation, even with an HGH build, I take the Healing Turret or Med Kit over it. A couple stacks of Might does not in any way outperform the substantial support the Healing Turret provides to your group or the raw healing and buffing to yourself that the Med Kit does—without any trait dependency.

The only reason I can think taking Elixir H is worth it is if you’re too lazy to just swap to the Med Kit and press 1-3 while running forward.

Medkit is an adventure style personal heal kit more intended for PvE than PvP IMO. In PvP it’s haphazard – one immob and you can’t reach any of your med supplies, you’re not fighting back while taking the time to hit multiple buttons to heal yourself, and by the way you left your friends back there while you were kiting out to heal yourself…

Elixir H is OK for HGH and cleansing but the benefits really stop there.

Heal Turret is the most functional and beneficial heal skill for Engi’s IMO. Single key for solid heal + regen, or detonated (one more key) for aoe healing + regen, with another water field combo available on the tool belt. Super simple, super fast, impressive results that your teammates get the benefit of as well.

Some heal skills just work better with particular builds but as to which heal skill is “the best”, I don’t see that there’s any debating Heal Turret being the most potent.

I gotta say I’m guilty of using Elixir H a lot. I shouldn’t, though, because it’s not a powerful as the other two.

The biggest benefit of Elixir H is the “Use and forget” aspect. With Healing Turret, you have to pick it up if you want that quick cooldown. With Med Kit, you have to use the toolbelt skill for the direct heal.

If you are going for an elixir build, especially with the CD reduction trait, I would recommend Elixir H. You drop to a 19 second CD and it heals the most out of all the others.

The big drawback to Elixir H is the amount of time it takes for it to heal you from the time you hit the button. A full second, which can be an eternity in a battle. You can be interrupted easily, which can hurt you for the 2-3 seconds of time it will take before you can cast it again.

The thing i do not like about the Turret is, the detonate/overcharge mechanic. Most heals in the game, you push the button, then when the timer is up, you push it again for another heal. I dunno, i just havent gotten used to dropping it and picking it right back up. It feels clunky in WvW. And if i forget to pick it up or detonate it, i feel like i have to wait a long time to actually heal myself.

Jester.1236:

The thing i do not like about the Turret is, the detonate/overcharge mechanic. Most heals in the game, you push the button, then when the timer is up, you push it again for another heal. I dunno, i just havent gotten used to dropping it and picking it right back up. It feels clunky in WvW. And if i forget to pick it up or detonate it, i feel like i have to wait a long time to actually heal myself.

That is the big setback with Healing Turret. You have to either pick it up or detonate it before you can use it again. Smart enemies will ignore your turret and go after you, keeping you from using your heal longer.

T1 wvw especially 3 way SM fights has so much skill lag that when you want turret most, you can no longer reliably time anything about it. Also, toolbelt skills seem to be harder to activate than utility, and weapon skills much easier again than utility during skill lag.

So fighting the lag is sometimes a consideration for choice.