Med Kits: Why? Some thoughts and ideas

Med Kits: Why? Some thoughts and ideas

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Posted by: WEXXES.2378

WEXXES.2378

Been playing for about 4 years now. 50%+ of my time has been on engineer alone. I play PvE, PvP, and WvW quite equally.

Just some thoughts and ideas that might intrigue some of you here.

Med Kit
“The bandages aren’t viable to use”.

The bandages, from the beginning of 2012, were never really used for other players. They were used for the one holding the kit: yourself, basically. The ability to throw them wasn’t meant for you to throw the bandages to others but to rather throw them on yourself for immediate consumption (especially when you were immobilized, crippled, or chilled). They still work like that today, and may explain why the bandages heal for so little and are just generally bad to use except when using on yourself.

Are they still clunky to use? Yea.
Are they worth using? Kinda. If you keep in mind that the bandages are basically used for yourself, they aren’t as bad as you think considering one the bandages now grants resistance.

They can be used to give benefits to other players but only in niche situations. It’s possible, but it’s a rather uncommon situation, and definitely not during combat.

I personally used Med Kit, and have done so for the longest time. I think the kit is actually in a good spot in terms of purpose but suffers from lack of hindsight to make better design decisions for the skills involved.

The following changes and ideas that follow are, in my opinion, much needed.

LIST OF CHANGES

Med Kit
The largest issue and QoL feature I think Med Kit needs is the amount of time you spend in it over a fight needs to be reduced when trying to help yourself. Med Blaster is in a great spot, but I think it could be a tiny bit better.

Just in case, healing values are done wiki style:
[Base Number] (Healing Power Coefficient)
Ex: 505 (0.25)
Which, with 1500 healing power, would heal for 880 with no other buffs.

-Med Blaster now scales off of the boons you have.
This makes way more sense since the engineer is great at creating boons for self, and the med kit provides many.

-All bandage duration increased to 24s from 12s.

-Throw Bandage healing is increased to 1111 (0.55), a 20% increase overall.
-CD increased to 10s from 5s
-Regeneration increase to 10s from 6s (17% decrease overall)

-Throw Stimulant cast time reduced to 0.5s from 0.75s
-Also grants Quickness for 2 seconds.
This addition allows you to boost your med blaster healing for a very short time when you need to by buffing yourself, or to quickly put out some DPS instead.

-Throw Accelerant cast time reduced to 0.5s from 0.75s
-CD increased to 20s from 15s
-Now removes all movement impairing effects (immobilize, Chill, Cripple)
-Swiftness duration increased to 15s from 10s (12% increase overall)

Elixir H
-Now always grants Protection(3.5s), Regeneration(8s), and Swiftness(15s).
-CD reduced to 20s from 25s.

Toss Elixir H (toolbelt)
-Now always grants Resistance (2.5s) to all affected allies
-CD increased to 30s from 25s

Flamethrower

Flame Blast
-Now ground targeted. Removed Detonate Flame Blast. Blast Finisher occurs where you target.

Smoke Vent
-Creates a smoke field around you that lasts for 1 second, blinding nearby foes once for 5s.
-CD increased to 25s from 20s

Bomb Kit

Concussion Bomb
-Now a blast finisher
-CD increased to 20s from 18s

A.E.D.

Static Shock (toolbelt)
-Now hits up to 5 enemies in a 180 radius.

Throw Mine

Minefield
-Now unblockable

Traits

Explosions
-Evasive Powder Keg CD reduced to 5s
-Aim Assisted Rocket is now a blast finisher
-Thermobaric Detonation CD reduced to 5s

Inventions
-Soothing Detonation reworked.
-Now creates water field blast finishers when blasting non-water fields.
-Blasting a water field increases your outgoing healing by 10% for 10s.

-Medical Dispersion Field
-Now also creates a water field that follows you for 2s when starting a heal skill. Has a CD of 10s.
-Radius of 360

Alchemy
-Stimulant Supplier reworked.
-Re-introduce Acidic Elixirs
-Elixirs become unblockable, removes boons when they land, and have larger radius.
-Boons removed: 2
-Radius increase from 180 to 360.

Tools
-Reactive Lenses
-Now only activates when disabled

-Adrenal Implant reworked
-Using a toolbelt skill grants 20 endurance.

-Gadgeteer bonuses
-Rocketboots now also breaks stuns in addition to it’s range increase
-Slick Shoes oil duration increased to 5s in addition to radius increase
-Personal Battering Ram now hits up to 3 targets and removes stability (after hit).
-A.E.D. also removes conditions regardless of taking fatal damage at the end.

Scrapper
-Expert Examination
-No longer applies vulnerability. Converts Protection boons into vulnerability from enemies instead.

-Adaptive Armor reworked
-No ICD
-Grants 20 toughness per stack, up to 20 stacks. Lasts 5s each.

Med Kits: Why? Some thoughts and ideas

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Posted by: FinalJustice.5824

FinalJustice.5824

I have to admit, there’s some pretty interesting stuff here I especially love all the Gadgeteer changes and REALLY love bringing back Acidic Elixers. I personally one day hope that we’ll get Sitting Duck back, but that might just be a forgone dream.

A few changes that I would make are:

- Reduce the cd of Automated Medical Response to 75 seconds.
- Make Magnetic Inversion (flip skill for Shield Skill 4) inflict Cripple to all opponents hit for 2 seconds.
- Make Throw Shield (flip skill for Shield Skill 5) grant Aegis for 6 seconds to you when it returns.

(edited by FinalJustice.5824)

Med Kits: Why? Some thoughts and ideas

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Posted by: WEXXES.2378

WEXXES.2378

I have to admit, there’s some pretty interesting stuff here I especially love all the Gadgeteer changes and REALLY love bringing back Acidic Elixers. I personally one day hope that we’ll get Sitting Duck back, but that might just be a forgone dream.

A few changes that I would make are:

- Reduce the cd of Automated Medical Response to 75 seconds.
- Make Magnetic Inversion (flip skill for Shield Skill 4) inflict Cripple to all opponents hit for 2 seconds.
- Make Throw Shield (flip skill for Shield Skill 5) grant Aegis for 6 seconds to you when it returns.

Thanks!

Sitting Duck brings back good memories.

Some thoughts:

-Reducing the CD of Automated Medical Response should actually be even lower than 75 seconds, down to 60, or proc at higher % values (50%+).

-Magnetic Inversion and Throw Shield (Static Shield) are perfect where they are: they don’t need changes at all. This is because Magnetic Inversion already has so much functionality in it and Static Shield is incredibly strong as it’s one of the few skills in the game that can stop evasive attacks (Blurred Frenzy) and can rip off a lot of stability on some people.

Med Kits: Why? Some thoughts and ideas

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Posted by: RabbitUp.8294

RabbitUp.8294

Shield is fine, at best it could use some cd trimming (like #4 20s, #5 25s). The only problem with shield is how bad mh pistol is, but now we are getting a second option.

As for med kit, med blast is extremely undertuned. The ally needs 7 boons before Med Blast can match an Ele’s Water Blast base healing, and that’s ignoring the significantly lower coefficient and higher cast time.

Med Kit replaces our heal skill, it shouldn’t? be this bad. Water Blast is 1 skill out of 20 and Ele can still use Wash the Pain and has access to more healing in general.

Med Kits: Why? Some thoughts and ideas

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Posted by: Xaylin.1860

Xaylin.1860

Med Kit

For Med Kit I’d still want something more like https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/engineer/Med-Kit/first#post6142479.

Some comments on other suggestions:

Bomb Kit

Concussion Bomb
-Now a blast finisher
-CD increased to 20s from 18s

I’d rather see the Confusion being removed and Concussion Bomb Daze enemies for 1-2s. Yeah, boohoo, condi Engi nerf. But we still need a better distinction between Grenades and Bombs and I hate that Bomb Kit is more about AA for Power while just rotating through 2-4 for Condi. I’m also not a big fan of Shrapnel because it clearly favours Grenades but oh well…

Additionally, I’d reduce the Burning on #2 and instead make it pulse more frequently to increase the physical damage and Vulnerability application.

Explosions
-Evasive Powder Keg CD reduced to 5s
-Aim Assisted Rocket is now a blast finisher
-Thermobaric Detonation CD reduced to 5s

A blast finisher on AAR is nice but you won’t be able to control it. Additionally, the bigger issue I got with Explosives when it comes to blast finishers is that EPK forces you to sacrifice a dodge plus TD competing with Siege Rounds which also provides a blast finisher.

I’d rather see EPK being removed/reworked and do something completely different. Maybe strip Boons or whatever.

Inventions
-Soothing Detonation reworked.
-Now creates water field blast finishers when blasting non-water fields.
-Blasting a water field increases your outgoing healing by 10% for 10s.

Besides adding the outgoing healing you didn’t really change much?

-Medical Dispersion Field
-Now also creates a water field that follows you for 2s when starting a heal skill. Has a CD of 10s.
-Radius of 360

This just turns all heals into pseudo Healing Turrets. I’d rather see the value of the shared healing increased to a more reasonable amount.

Since we’re at it… Bunker Down should lose those bandages. It’s just weird. Maybe add a very short amount of Protection (1s) if within the blast radius?

Alchemy
-Stimulant Supplier reworked.
-Re-introduce Acidic Elixirs
-Elixirs become unblockable, removes boons when they land, and have larger radius.
-Boons removed: 2
-Radius increase from 180 to 360.

Yet another Elixir trait? Why?

Scrapper
-Expert Examination
-No longer applies vulnerability. Converts Protection boons into vulnerability from enemies instead.

This sounds very cool!

Med Kits: Why? Some thoughts and ideas

in Engineer

Posted by: WEXXES.2378

WEXXES.2378

Med Kit

For Med Kit I’d still want something more like https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/engineer/Med-Kit/first#post6142479.

Some comments on other suggestions:

Bomb Kit

Concussion Bomb
-Now a blast finisher
-CD increased to 20s from 18s

I’d rather see the Confusion being removed and Concussion Bomb Daze enemies for 1-2s. Yeah, boohoo, condi Engi nerf. But we still need a better distinction between Grenades and Bombs and I hate that Bomb Kit is more about AA for Power while just rotating through 2-4 for Condi. I’m also not a big fan of Shrapnel because it clearly favours Grenades but oh well…

Additionally, I’d reduce the Burning on #2 and instead make it pulse more frequently to increase the physical damage and Vulnerability application.

Explosions
-Evasive Powder Keg CD reduced to 5s
-Aim Assisted Rocket is now a blast finisher
-Thermobaric Detonation CD reduced to 5s

A blast finisher on AAR is nice but you won’t be able to control it. Additionally, the bigger issue I got with Explosives when it comes to blast finishers is that EPK forces you to sacrifice a dodge plus TD competing with Siege Rounds which also provides a blast finisher.

I’d rather see EPK being removed/reworked and do something completely different. Maybe strip Boons or whatever.

Inventions
-Soothing Detonation reworked.
-Now creates water field blast finishers when blasting non-water fields.
-Blasting a water field increases your outgoing healing by 10% for 10s.

Besides adding the outgoing healing you didn’t really change much?

-Medical Dispersion Field
-Now also creates a water field that follows you for 2s when starting a heal skill. Has a CD of 10s.
-Radius of 360

This just turns all heals into pseudo Healing Turrets. I’d rather see the value of the shared healing increased to a more reasonable amount.

Since we’re at it… Bunker Down should lose those bandages. It’s just weird. Maybe add a very short amount of Protection (1s) if within the blast radius?

Alchemy
-Stimulant Supplier reworked.
-Re-introduce Acidic Elixirs
-Elixirs become unblockable, removes boons when they land, and have larger radius.
-Boons removed: 2
-Radius increase from 180 to 360.

Yet another Elixir trait? Why?

Scrapper
-Expert Examination
-No longer applies vulnerability. Converts Protection boons into vulnerability from enemies instead.

This sounds very cool!

>Besides adding the outgoing healing you didn’t really change much?

It’s a huge change. It means you can blast any field and it have the same effect as blasting water on top of blasting the field type it is. This is a huge problem in PvE that basically prevents engineer from reaching it’s healing potential.

>This just turns all heals into pseudo Healing Turrets. I’d rather see the value of the shared healing increased to a more reasonable amount.

The lack of water field(s) is a huge reason why people don’t take other healing skills in group content. The amount it already heals is actually in a good spot since it is affected by your outgoing healing %.

>Yet another Elixir trait? Why?

The alchemy line is basically about the use of elixirs. Because of the trait it replaces, it makes people choose between HGH and Acidic Elixirs.

As for the rest: fair enough. Thanks for responding!

Med Kits: Why? Some thoughts and ideas

in Engineer

Posted by: tigirius.9014

tigirius.9014

Bandages are terrible these days I agree, there’s alot of good stuff in this list.

I think the duration of the med spray we do in section 1 could be improved made longer given a large heal at the end of the spray.

I think also that the other options such as bandages if kept should when using the traits for healing, be given the option of throwing out a large number of bandages at once at the very least.

I think that bandages should shoot bandages out at friendlies like a gun, we are engineers throwing bandages is not our style. We need a bandage gun, that should be power number 2.

Powers 3-4-5 should all become spray nozzles and we should spray those effects on our friendlies.

Powers for medkit should look like this:

1
Med Blaster
Heal allies with a wave of healing energy for a total of 4 heals the most powerful of which occurs at the end of the spraying. Heals more for each boon on that ally.
2
Bandage Gun
Fires a bandage at friendly characters, 1 second cooldown between each bandage.
3
Spray Stimulant in front of engineer in a 45 degree cone. heals, grants fury, and removes a debilitating condition (weakness, blind, vulnerability).
4
Spray Accelerant in front of the engineer in a 45 degree cone. heals, grants swiftness, and removes a movement-impairing condition (immobilize, chill, cripple)
5
Spray Antidote in front of the engineer in a 45 degree cone. heals, cures a condition, and applies resistance.

They could in fact add conditions to the three final skills if an enemy happened to get in the way of the sprays.

Balance Team: Please Fix Mine Toolbelt Positioning!