Q:
Nade/Bomb is counter intuitive for "Engineer"
Would I have built Engineer from the ground up differently (thanks to hindsight!), yes.
Would I ask them to rework nades/bombs now, no.
Making major playstyle changes years into a game would be a mistake. That said I’d love for some of the “engineer-y” skills (gadgets/turrets mainly) get some actual power and purpose.
Would I have built Engineer from the ground up differently (thanks to hindsight!), yes.
Would I ask them to rework nades/bombs now, no.Making major playstyle changes years into a game would be a mistake. That said I’d love for some of the “engineer-y” skills (gadgets/turrets mainly) get some actual power and purpose.
Honestly, as I said in past posts, the best way to provide Engineer a new playstyle that does not depend 90% on kits, such as bombs and grenade kit, as it is now is to introduce a Elite Spec that focus more on the Main Weapons such as a Technomancer Elite Spec or maybe a Psychic Elite Spec.
Psychic Elite Spec would be interesting because it would use the mental attacks and the laws of physics to battle enemies using the Engineer’s technology to access these powers. It would also make a good Focus Main Hand Weapon Elite Spec for Engineer.
As of now current playstyle depends on Kits because there is very few means to focus on Main Weapon for decent damage.
A New Elite Spec that changes the function of the Toolbelt (aka F skills) into a new system such as maybe Psychics use the F skills to switch into 3 different Forms that change the Main Weapon being Statics, Dynamics, and Synergetics with each providing the Main Weapon, rifle, pistols, shield, and elite spec weapon Focus, a new set of skills.
The F4 skill can activate a 4th set of skills, called Eternal, more powerful than Statics, Dynamics, and Synergetics skills but is limited on time and has its own energy bar to show how much time they can use the F4 form skills.
(edited by EdwinLi.1284)
While we’re dreaming, I’d like to ride around on a dinosaur wearing a mecha-suit.
While we’re dreaming, I’d like to ride around on a dinosaur wearing a mecha-suit.
I would it not call dreaming since the F skills (F1 to F5) have a lot of potential to be changed in different ways to introduce new unique functions for each future elite specs.
One way it can be changed is to change the Main weapon equipped such as Rifle, Pistol, Shield, and Elite Spec weapon into new set of skills unique to each weapon.
Another could be that it is changed into a type of Kit system with each F skills from F1 to F5 being a type of unique kit for the new Elite Spec for a Kit focused Elite Spec.
There are plenty of ways the F1 to F5 skills can be changed in future Elite spec to suit different play styles that both depend on Kits and not depend on Kits but it is up to Anet which playstyle they want to introduce.
While we’re dreaming, I’d like to ride around on a dinosaur wearing a mecha-suit.
I would it not call dreaming since the F skills (F1 to F5) have a lot of potential to be changed in different ways to introduce new unique functions for each future elite specs.
One way it can be changed is to change the Main weapon equipped such as Rifle, Pistol, Shield, and Elite Spec weapon into new set of skills unique to each weapon.
Another could be that it is changed into a type of Kit system with each F skills from F1 to F5 being a type of unique kit for the new Elite Spec for a Kit focused Elite Spec.
There are plenty of ways the F1 to F5 skills can be changed in future Elite spec to suit different play styles that both depend on Kits and not depend on Kits but it is up to Anet which playstyle they want to introduce.
I think a mech-pilot type spec would be really fun and could make good use of the Toolbelt mechanic.
Let’s say there are 6 new skills we can slot in our utility bar and each of them are mech-suits. They function just like kits, we can enter or exit them at will. We keep our utility and weapon skills but our Toolbelt skills are changed to the suit specific role. Let’s say for example one suits role is mobility and each Toolbelt skill grants some form of Swiftness, Superspeed, leaps or shadow steps. You trade off your “normal” Toolbelt skills while you’re in the suit but can leave it at any time to regain access to them.
I dunno, just brainstorming with you, lol.
Champion: Phantom, Hunter, Legionnaire, Genius
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The problem with all these solutions is that they don’t actually get Worse when you add kits to them. If we’re talking DPS, they’d just get better because you get powerful weapon skills with unique cooldowns to add to your rotations. Kits are always going to have a place on any Engineer’s Utility Bar in PvE. There will most likely always be at least 1 in PvP because Engi lacks weapon swap, as well.
Also, only so many ways you can reliably change their Toolbelt Skills, as they’ve got some traits hinging on them working as they are right now.
Your best bet for a Non-Kit Engi is probably a Support kit of some kind, with Utilities and Mechanics designed to buff or Heal (or both) allies similar to a Druid.
Thief – Duelist | Ranger – Strider | Engineer – Technician |
Elementalist – Spellweaver | Necromancer – Warlock | Mesmer – Trickster |
engineer as a whole needs a rework, hell the profession initially was designed to be a heavy armor one but was changed at the end to use medium armor cuz fancy coats
this is reflected on how most big damage skills are medium-close ranged
Would I have built Engineer from the ground up differently (thanks to hindsight!), yes.
Would I ask them to rework nades/bombs now, no.Making major playstyle changes years into a game would be a mistake. That said I’d love for some of the “engineer-y” skills (gadgets/turrets mainly) get some actual power and purpose.
Honestly, as I said in past posts, the best way to provide Engineer a new playstyle that does not depend 90% on kits, such as bombs and grenade kit, as it is now is to introduce a Elite Spec that focus more on the Main Weapons such as a Technomancer Elite Spec or maybe a Psychic Elite Spec. .
You mean like Scrapper with hammer?
The problem with all these solutions is that they don’t actually get Worse when you add kits to them. If we’re talking DPS, they’d just get better because you get powerful weapon skills with unique cooldowns to add to your rotations. Kits are always going to have a place on any Engineer’s Utility Bar in PvE. There will most likely always be at least 1 in PvP because Engi lacks weapon swap, as well.
Also, only so many ways you can reliably change their Toolbelt Skills, as they’ve got some traits hinging on them working as they are right now.
Your best bet for a Non-Kit Engi is probably a Support kit of some kind, with Utilities and Mechanics designed to buff or Heal (or both) allies similar to a Druid.
It is not about making a gameplay style worse using a kit but providing more options into Engineer’s gameplay style so that player have more options not to depend on Kits for 90% of their gameplay.
There will be kits in majority of builds but really most players only use 1 or 2 skills from majority of the kits they have on.
that way Engineer can have a better choice between focusing only on main weapon thus using all their utility skills for something not a Kit, Mix between Main Weapon and kits, or focusing only on kits for combat.
As of now majority of gameplay for Engineer is focus on kits for combat or mixing their main weapon with kits but few options for focusing only on Main Weapon only.
A new Elite Spec that changes the toolbelt into a “Main Weapon Kits” that change the Main Weapon’s skills based on which F1 to F4 or F5 skill chosen may provide far more room for the option to focus only on Main hand weapon and using utility only for other utility skills not a Kit.
Of course this will also add more options to the “Mix Main Weapon/Kit” option and “Kit Only” option in gameplay style as well if the player can handle the new set of 15 or 20 news skills for each Main Weapon and elite spec weapon with the other skills in each kits.
You mean like Scrapper with hammer?
Honestly the Hammer was introduced to be Engineer’s first main hand melee weapon and was nice but it fell into the “Mix between Main hand and Kit” option because it was a Melee range weapon and Kits still had to be depended on for the Range combat if Scrappers wanted to cover both Range and Melee or help break a breakbar.
(edited by EdwinLi.1284)
The problem with all these solutions is that they don’t actually get Worse when you add kits to them. If we’re talking DPS, they’d just get better because you get powerful weapon skills with unique cooldowns to add to your rotations. Kits are always going to have a place on any Engineer’s Utility Bar in PvE. There will most likely always be at least 1 in PvP because Engi lacks weapon swap, as well.
Also, only so many ways you can reliably change their Toolbelt Skills, as they’ve got some traits hinging on them working as they are right now.
Your best bet for a Non-Kit Engi is probably a Support kit of some kind, with Utilities and Mechanics designed to buff or Heal (or both) allies similar to a Druid.
It is not about making a gameplay style worse using a kit but providing more options into Engineer’s gameplay style so that player have more options not to depend on Kits for 90% of their gameplay.
There will be kits in majority of builds but really most players only use 1 or 2 skills from majority of the kits they have on.
that way Engineer can have a better choice between focusing only on main weapon thus using all their utility skills for something not a Kit, Mix between Main Weapon and kits, or focusing only on kits for combat.
As of now majority of gameplay for Engineer is focus on kits for combat or mixing their main weapon with kits but few options for focusing only on Main Weapon only.
A new Elite Spec that changes the toolbelt into a “Main Weapon Kits” that change the Main Weapon’s skills based on which F1 to F4 or F5 skill chosen may provide far more room for the option to focus only on Main hand weapon and using utility only for other utility skills not a Kit.
Of course this will also add more options to the “Mix Main Weapon/Kit” option and “Kit Only” option in gameplay style as well if the player can handle the new set of 15 or 20 news skills for each Main Weapon and elite spec weapon with the other skills in each kits.
While true for PvP, in PvE you’d only see even more convoluted and extensive rotations incorporating kits and the new “Weapon Skills” rather than room being made for other Utilities, if the Engi remains a DPS spec.
You could add 25 new weapon skills and Kits would still make up the entirety of the Engi’s PvE Utility Bar when specced for DPS. If you change the Engi into an Ele with attunements on the F1-F5 keys you’re basically just adding 5 more Kits to the mix, because when it comes down to it Kits are already just 5 extra Weapon Skills. The playstyle wouldn’t change at all, only the visuals and the skill requirement for getting top DPS, which in turn would only serve to make Engi even more difficult to manage in Raids.
The “Option” to focus on Main Hand weapon only that you describe won’t be a reality in PvE scenarios unless you give the Engi new Utility Skills that match the Kits in terms of DPS and/or Utility, such as party-wide buffs akin to Warrior Banners or Druid Glyphs. And if that’s the case, you really don’t need to copy/paste Elementalist onto Engineer’s Toolbelt skills anyways, better to focus on entirely new gameplay in that case.
Thief – Duelist | Ranger – Strider | Engineer – Technician |
Elementalist – Spellweaver | Necromancer – Warlock | Mesmer – Trickster |
The “Option” to focus on Main Hand weapon only that you describe won’t be a reality in PvE scenarios unless you give the Engi new Utility Skills that match the Kits in terms of DPS and/or Utility, such as party-wide buffs akin to Warrior Banners or Druid Glyphs. And if that’s the case, you really don’t need to copy/paste Elementalist onto Engineer’s Toolbelt skills anyways, better to focus on entirely new gameplay in that case.
Honestly, the only way I see Engineer providing more non-kit focus gameplay is for Engineer to get new gameplay styles from future Elite Specs. However, by how the profession is designed it most likely may get new gameplay by adjusting the Toolbelt (F1 to F5) into new unique system exclusive to the Elite Spec. I did not mention utility because I rather not go into assuming all viable Elite Specs that can finally move away kit depended gameplay style would require massive amount of buffs and healing utility since it is still possible with the right adjustments to gameplay that the new Elite Spec Utility can still function with decent Damage Utility skills.
Scrapper was a nice addition to Engineer but it was a Extension Elite Spec designed to add a little something extra on a already existing gameplay style, being the F button for auto res and finisher, rather than changing the core system of Engineer being their Toolbelts. The new utility being drones are nice but they still felt more as extension to Engineer’s Core Profession design.
Yes trying to beat the current “Meta” in PvE will be near impossible since the community has established Kits being 100% required to meet the “Meta” damage rate for endgame content but the funny thing about “Meta” standards is that they only remain Meta until someone else decide to diverge from it and discover something of equal or greater value.
Now back to Elite Specs…
From here it is most likely we may see future Elite Specs changing Gameplay styles of Engineer by adjusting the Toolbelt into new functions that may adjust gameplay style to focus less on kits and more on using the new Toolbelt system. The way I see it Anet has set up two types of Elite Specs being the Extension Elite Specs that only add on to Core profession current gameplay style (being Scrapper, Tempest, Berserker, Chronomancer, and Revenant) and the Unique Elite Spec that changes and adjust the core system into a new set of skills and functions thus changing the gameplay style (such as Reaper, Druid, and Dragonhunter).
(edited by EdwinLi.1284)
Yes trying to beat the current “Meta” in PvE will be near impossible since the community has established Kits being 100% required to meet the “Meta” damage rate for endgame content but the funny thing about “Meta” standards is that they only remain Meta until someone else decide to diverge from it and discover something of equal or greater value.
Now back to Elite Specs…
From here it is most likely we may see future Elite Specs changing Gameplay styles of Engineer by adjusting the Toolbelt into new functions that may adjust gameplay style to focus less on kits and more on using the new Toolbelt system. The way I see it Anet has set up two types of Elite Specs being the Extension Elite Specs that only add on to Core profession current gameplay style (being Scrapper, Tempest, Berserker, Chronomancer, and Revenant) and the Unique Elite Spec that changes and adjust the core system into a new set of skills and functions thus changing the gameplay style (such as Reaper, Druid, and Dragonhunter).
A problem with changing the Core of Engineer is the Trait Synergy with already existing Traits. Change Toolbelt skills too much and they might not end up working with current traits at all (Such as Static Discharge, for instance).
And it’s quite the faux pas to call that the “Community” has decided on Kits being meta, as the decisive factor isn’t with a anyone’s personal preference but rather the numbers (In DPS) that comes from using kits, and the way GW2 Combat is designed. While it’s true that the Meta is a fluctuating concept, let me try and put my concerns like this (This is talking PvE):
If you change the Profession Skills of the Engineer with an Elite Spec to rival the DPS that kits allow, then Kits will simply add to the DPS with how they are designed. Unless new Utility Skills are introduced which can either rival Kits in DPS, or provide much greater Utility that is necessary in Raids (Unique Buffs, Boons etc), then there will be no reason NOT to run kits anyways. It’d be like having your cake, and eating it too.
(Also, I find it odd that you consider Druid to have made major changes but not the Scrapper. Both only got a function added rather than having Profession Skills changed, but through their new weapon, skills and function was changed greatly in playstyle. Druids became Healers and Bunkers, where Rangers are neither, while Scrapper became a Melee Bruiser where Core Engineers typically were midrange Bunkers.)
Thief – Duelist | Ranger – Strider | Engineer – Technician |
Elementalist – Spellweaver | Necromancer – Warlock | Mesmer – Trickster |
Toolbelt spec: now toolbelt skills are based on the weapon skills equipped instead of the utilities, kits doesnt count on this.
#done
I’m sick to death of grenade spam, pretty much for all the reasons you mentioned.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0OWwwqPxDI