Guild Wars 2

Kalan.9705:

I think a few people might overlook that Engineer having no weapon swap, our abysmally tiny weapon selection (p/p, p/sh, rifle that is it), and also no ability to choose different / better sigils and stat setup on our other weapon swap are all very strong counters to the few upsides like swapping for battle procs.

Engineer can’t hchoose appropriate sigils for the toolkit versus the rifle, we don’t have that capability.

I used to think that too until I realized precisely how strong the nature of attunement swaps and kit swapping is as far as on swap sigils go for their comparative efficacy to other classes. Most other sigils have a relatively minor effect in comparison. Strength VS battle, for instance.

And plus, at any given moment any class can have 2 sigils active MAX. The same rings true for engis except that engis get a large bonus from being able to swap on demand.

And as far as diversification goes, I don’t think that happens very often at all on other classes since most just stack the same sigil twice over. The only one I can genuinely think of would be a ranger with earth on shortbow and geomancy on sword/torch.

I’m sorry guys, but a lot of these nerfs in the grand scheme of things are pretty justified and I saw most of them coming a mile away. I just hope they aren’t TOO harsh and I hope the buffs that come with them open up more possibilities for new builds.

I came out of SOTG pretty happy all in all, it seems like the devs know their stuff more than I thought.

Penguin.5197:

Mif.3471:

He said we should use Tool Kit.

So basically they expect every Engineer to give up a utility slot and bring tool kit because they can’t be bothered to design the game with any intelligence.

Well they did give us a tool kit to fix the problems ourselves..those lazy devs >.>

But anyways, to bypass guardian bubbles and ele’s earth shield skill thing you could also try flamethrower. Flamethrower is a unique weapon, flame jet is not a projectile so it can bypass those defenses but it doesn’t count as a melee weapon either for skills like riposte

Yes…. shoot a guardian with your flamethrower. That should be fun to watch.

timidobserver.7925:

Penguin.5197:

Mif.3471:

He said we should use Tool Kit.

So basically they expect every Engineer to give up a utility slot and bring tool kit because they can’t be bothered to design the game with any intelligence.

Well they did give us a tool kit to fix the problems ourselves..those lazy devs >.>

But anyways, to bypass guardian bubbles and ele’s earth shield skill thing you could also try flamethrower. Flamethrower is a unique weapon, flame jet is not a projectile so it can bypass those defenses but it doesn’t count as a melee weapon either for skills like riposte

Yes…. shoot a guardian with your flamethrower. That should be fun to watch.

Ive done it before in spvp while playing a flamethrower build, its how I personally found out about it. I think we were both surprised when he went down :P

Must have been a bad guardian.

Mif.3471:

Grackleflint.4956:

Chaba.5410:

What was up with that talk about prybar as a counter for something? I don’t use toolkit in my wvw support build (except underwater).

Grouch was talking about how we are strictly a ranged class and Guardians can shut down our damage completely by popping their defensive bubble, to which Jon Sharp flippantly replied “Yeah, so.” Then Karl said something about going into it and using melee.

So apparently Guardians should fear our Wrench #1 dps!

He said we should use Tool Kit.

So basically they expect every Engineer to give up a utility slot and bring tool kit because they can’t be bothered to design the game with any intelligence.

Many guardians drop a utility slot JUST to grab the spirit shield if they so choose it. Most guardians don’t even run it anymore since anything without projectiles can breath on it and it’ll die. Its AI is also metrically kitten Any guardian would pick that up ONLY so that they can hard counter an engi. A better choice would be wall of reflection.

I don’t think grouch’s ire is well placed. A larger problem is the guardian’s minor trait that creates a shield of absorbtion around the downed player when they start to revive. It’s extra long and literally prevents any damage on body from a large majority of classes, especially engis.

The comment about nothing going to be focusing the heal turret in WvW was pretty depressing. If you put a heal turret anywhere it can actually heal anyone who isn’t backed out of a fight, the turret melts in under a second. It’s shocking that the devs appear to genuinely have no clue about how turrets actually perform in WvW when the only buffs to offset the many nerfs are for turrets these days.

Another thing I thought about, Supply Crate Healing Turret is going to kick kitten

Ostricheggs.3742:

Mif.3471:

Grackleflint.4956:

Chaba.5410:

What was up with that talk about prybar as a counter for something? I don’t use toolkit in my wvw support build (except underwater).

Grouch was talking about how we are strictly a ranged class and Guardians can shut down our damage completely by popping their defensive bubble, to which Jon Sharp flippantly replied “Yeah, so.” Then Karl said something about going into it and using melee.

So apparently Guardians should fear our Wrench #1 dps!

He said we should use Tool Kit.

So basically they expect every Engineer to give up a utility slot and bring tool kit because they can’t be bothered to design the game with any intelligence.

Many guardians drop a utility slot JUST to grab the spirit shield if they so choose it. Most guardians don’t even run it anymore since anything without projectiles can breath on it and it’ll die. Its AI is also metrically kitten Any guardian would pick that up ONLY so that they can hard counter an engi. A better choice would be wall of reflection.

I don’t think grouch’s ire is well placed. A larger problem is the guardian’s minor trait that creates a shield of absorbtion around the downed player when they start to revive. It’s extra long and literally prevents any damage on body from a large majority of classes, especially engis.

I mostly brought it up in regards to the expanded spirit weapon health pools, not because I think it’s a problem on live. I don’t think it will be a problem post-patch either, just because it is so niche.

Sometimes my mouth just moves and words come out.

Nord.5360:

Ostricheggs.3742:

Mif.3471:

Grackleflint.4956:

Chaba.5410:

What was up with that talk about prybar as a counter for something? I don’t use toolkit in my wvw support build (except underwater).

Grouch was talking about how we are strictly a ranged class and Guardians can shut down our damage completely by popping their defensive bubble, to which Jon Sharp flippantly replied “Yeah, so.” Then Karl said something about going into it and using melee.

So apparently Guardians should fear our Wrench #1 dps!

He said we should use Tool Kit.

So basically they expect every Engineer to give up a utility slot and bring tool kit because they can’t be bothered to design the game with any intelligence.

Many guardians drop a utility slot JUST to grab the spirit shield if they so choose it. Most guardians don’t even run it anymore since anything without projectiles can breath on it and it’ll die. Its AI is also metrically kitten Any guardian would pick that up ONLY so that they can hard counter an engi. A better choice would be wall of reflection.

I don’t think grouch’s ire is well placed. A larger problem is the guardian’s minor trait that creates a shield of absorbtion around the downed player when they start to revive. It’s extra long and literally prevents any damage on body from a large majority of classes, especially engis.

I mostly brought it up in regards to the expanded spirit weapon health pools, not because I think it’s a problem on live. I don’t think it will be a problem post-patch either, just because it is so niche.

Sometimes my mouth just moves and words come out.

HE SPEAKS!
BOW BEFORE HIM PLEBS!

Kalan.9705:

The comment about nothing going to be focusing the heal turret in WvW was pretty depressing.

It stood out to me too.

As a WvW player, I found it kind of offensive that they think WvW players are so generally stupid that in a zerg of 60 players there wouldn’t even be 5 players (ala sPvP) smart enough to focus down a turret giving out area heals.

Phineas Poe.3018:

That seriously hurts the Flamethrower for no good reason.

I agree. It’s exactly like the kit refinement nerf—a mandatory 10-point trait for certain niche builds/playstyles (yes, 4-kit was a niche build and so is flamethrower). People got upset when their multi-kit builds took a hit as well, if you recall. I more expected it to become 1s of burn on a 3s cooldown, though. I’m pretty sure this is slightly better, although not greatly.

The elixir S nerf is too bad, since it was just really fun to do stuff while small. It was certainly justified, though, since S is still one of the best stunbreakers in the game. I think I’m the only one who uses S for bunkering—everyone else just seems to stomp with it, so no effective change there.

Confusion nerf means WvW builds will start looking more like our tournament build.

Retal change could be nice.

Healing turret overcharge CD reduction is actually a really big buff. When turrets get better targeting I can see 2-3 turret builds becoming very strong, now that they would have condition removal.

Overall, nothing gamebreaking, but zero new build options have opened, except I suppose a low crit chance build that uses incendiary powder. I don’t think we lost too much build diversity this patch, although off-hand shield and flamethrower both took a hit due to the IP change.

So in the end, another okay-ish patch in which we don’t lose too much build diversity but certainly don’t gain any. The healing turret change could come into play to create build diversity, but that can’t happen until turrets in general become viable.

I just dislike that it means that to get the most out of the Flamethrower, you have to put another skill on your bar: the Flame Turret. Without it, this Incendiary Powder nerf hurts the viability of the FT badly.

Beyond the change to Kit Refinement, the FT is already tethered to 60 points between three different trees to get the most out of it.

I’m just seriously clueless why this provision was necessary, or that they totally didn’t think about this at all when deciding this change.

I think I’ll be playing my Engineer less after this patch, which is really sad. I’ve put a significant amount of work into my build.

I’m very frustrated.

Phineas Poe.3018:

I just dislike that it means that to get the most out of the Flamethrower, you have to put another skill on your bar: the Flame Turret. Without it, this Incendiary Powder nerf hurts the viability of the FT badly.

Beyond the change to Kit Refinement, the FT is already tethered to 60 points between three different trees to get the most out of it.

I’m just seriously clueless why this provision was necessary, or that they totally didn’t think about this at all when deciding this change.

I think I’ll be playing my Engineer less after this patch, which is really sad. I’ve put a significant amount of work into my build.

I’m very frustrated.

Judging from your signature, you have a warrior so you can play the new FOTM.

Phineas Poe.3018:

I just dislike that it means that to get the most out of the Flamethrower, you have to put another skill on your bar: the Flame Turret. Without it, this Incendiary Powder nerf hurts the viability of the FT badly.

Beyond the change to Kit Refinement, the FT is already tethered to 60 points between three different trees to get the most out of it.

I’m just seriously clueless why this provision was necessary, or that they totally didn’t think about this at all when deciding this change.

I think I’ll be playing my Engineer less after this patch, which is really sad. I’ve put a significant amount of work into my build.

I’m very frustrated.

I feel for you. Nothing feels quite like your own personal niche build getting steamrolled by a poorly-thought-out rework to something that may have been overpowered when used a different way. I used to use flamethrower in my bunker build for the condition removal, but had to change after the KR nerf.

Well on the bright side, after watching the sog again I saw they admitted our gadgets are useless. There may yet be hope for gadgets after all.

yea, also Anet developers do play engineer, and some of them are really good like power on hgh i think he’s called.

AsmallChicken.9634:

Another thing I thought about, Supply Crate Healing Turret is going to kick kitten

Burst heal > Sustained heal. But if the heal stacks, then this idea sounds pretty cool, at least for PvE. I hope the water field will last longer than the current or if it’s going to be like Ranger’s Healing Spring.

I guess everyone saw the confusion nerf in WvW coming. We’ll see how the whole boon hate thing works out.

Other than that it mostly looks like the Engineer class will be even more clunky to use in the future. I certainly won’t start slotting turrets and gadgets in their current form, no matter what they nerf and how badly. I’ll just play the class even less or finally completely shelve it.

DELETED. Nevermind. No use worrying about it until we see patch notes.

I feel kinda let down about the boon-hate thing. I think we can still deal with thieves as we tend to put on a lot of boons and usually, might would be the last boon we would have. I’m more annoyed at the warriors =/ Now, idk if I can eat a 100b to the face. =(

google.3709:

Glass cannon warriors will be able to 1 shot Engi’s ele’s Guardians etc since boon hate was placed on the Discipline which focus around Critical damage instead of a defensive trait. Currently i can push killshot to 19.6k max, now add 15% more damage from avg 5 boons you see on this classes, imagine eviscerate on anyone running lysssa’s runes

I am, in fact, using Lyssa runes with Elixir X (haven’t touched Supply Crate for two months now, feels good). My jimmies are rustled.

Once again anet ha 0 clue of engineer. Lets just nerf everythin just in case. NOTHING IS GIVEN BACK!!! ENGINEER WAS BETTER IN BETA!!

Having watched the whole video all i have to say is:

1. These people don’t have a clue about the Engineer class and how it plays anywhere else but on paper.

2. ANY class has a higher priority than Engineer when it comes to being fixed/buffed/balanced. It is evident by their willingness to discuss anything else but Engineers and the level of excitement shown while discussing.

3. You would get a more coherent plan for the future of this class if you spoke to a mentally challenged person who just had 3 strokes back to back.

To me this video was the equivalent of them giving me the finger with one hand, while waving whatever money i have spent so far on this game on the other. My patience is running dry and i am beginning to feel scammed in the same way someone who bought a FIAT with a Ferrari badge slapped onto it.

As a result of the behaviour showcased and the course of actions that has been chosen my patience is not only running dry but so is my willingness to believe that it will ever be high enough on the “to-do” list. As such i will be considering quitting this game and suggesting to anyone i know that they do not involve themselves with it.

To the moderator: I invite you to watch the state of the game video from start to end before you evaluate whether this post is inflammatory or not (class trailer and website info – optional ).

Yea, I gotta say, with engineer bugs still outstanding (e.g., Scope), it is impossible to really balance the classes.

I can understand the warrior buffs, after last patch and all.

But did they really have to pick thieves to be the ultimate anti-class for boons?
Not to mention they benefit from your boons as well.
I’ll throw out another wild idea: nerf confusion, and give Prybar boonhate! Engineers aren’t all HGH, and we could have used something special.

Healing turret: if it dies in aoe, it doesn’t matter whatever it COULD HAVE done if it hadn’t died…
The changes might be great, but if the turret itself doesn’t live long enough, they won’t do much.
Since when do people have to focus a healing turret in short range dev’s? Really? It dies from aoe, maybe try it before you comment on it.

Just a question: so engineers picked up their healing turret? Not detonate it?
Sure about that? I’m not, you see. I think we usually detonated the healing turret after putting it down.
It’s a small difference, a little detail. Something that distinguishes hearsay from personal experience…

So, how about the bug fixes and a gadget review?

Problem is: will healing turret’s radius be long enough to actually let it be put OUT of the point and still be healed?

That’s the only way turrets aren’t going to be blown up in seconds in large fights.

The only way people should actually THINK about downing the turret, not just spam their usual rotation on you and destroy doing the same thing as if it didn’t exist.

If healing turret’s radius will be large enough, I’l be REALLY happy: having another choice aside of med kit for point defending is a good thing.

P.S.: sometimes I use Rocket Boots for the Falcon kick skill, on survivability/condition hybrid builds. But I hate the fact the utility skill is more like a “I REALLY want to die button”: I don’t know if something has changed, but now most of the time I don’t even get pushed back. I just knock myself down.

Let me do this joke:
Maybe engineers are masters of cc. Surely they are masters of self-cc.XD

Does Rifled-Turret Barrels affect the range of its combo fields?

The Incendiary Powder trait I can deal with, tbth I haven’t used the trait in awhile since moving a heavier armor build (I also have a new flavor which will get posted later in my guide).

But the change to Elixir S has me worried. They worded it “utilities” not “kits” but I can see “kits” still being effected by this change, not being able to drop in to medkit after elixir s to drop stimulant or bandage is going to HURT so many engies.

RE: Healing turret: If they have lowered the CD on the Overcharge to 20 seconds, then the turret is now a condi removal bomb every 20 seconds, just like rifle turret is an SD overload ability.

drop → overcharge → explode → (20sec) → rinse/repeat

which I think is pretty stellar as a quick and lovely combo field and condition solution …

but what about heals over time, anet? regen is all but useless until you let our turrets scale with our stats!

Kimbald.2697:

I can understand the warrior buffs, after last patch and all.

But did they really have to pick thieves to be the ultimate anti-class for boons?
Not to mention they benefit from your boons as well.
I’ll throw out another wild idea: nerf confusion, and give Prybar boonhate! Engineers aren’t all HGH, and we could have used something special.

They will never put boon hate on prybar because that’ll just add another on a already sizable list of reasons not to use the mine utility since that is a preexisting source of boon-hate

Using Turrets means no weapon sweap and no condtion remove. :/

LOL yeah, in WvW NO one attacks healing turrets….because AoE isn’t the main method of attack at all….

Wvw that turret isn’t going to last long enough to do any passive healing. It will die quicker than in PvP, if anything in WvW is where it needs the hp buff.

(edit) Not related to what i said before, but where the heck is our 20% cooldown reduction for our turrets!?

Like Forty Seven Ninjas.6982:

(edit) Not related to what i said before, but where the heck is our 20% cooldown reduction for our turrets!?

Retrieving your turret will give you that.

redslion.9675:

Problem is: will healing turret’s radius be long enough to actually let it be put OUT of the point and still be healed?

This is the problem with mortar as well. If the range were longer, there would not be much of a need to up the survivability. As is, it needs to be able to stay standing under AoE barrage.

AsmallChicken.9634:

Another thing I thought about, Supply Crate Healing Turret is going to kick kitten

No. They still haven’t updated the turrets to the current models we drop with the skills. To see this in action, let one of these take damage and then hit it with your wrench to see how much it heals for.

So the shiny new turret won’t instant heal for as much as the old model, and the old model in the supply drop won’t instant heal at all, just give us a regen field without cleansing burst.

Also, still won’t trigger elite runes, won’t scale to your healing bonus… (or didn’t the last time I checked).

I am just going to get some Elixir V (prolly Grey Goose) and wait for the patch notes.

timidobserver.7925:

Judging from your signature, you have a warrior so you can play the new FOTM.

Uh, I guess?

I’m glad that Warrior is getting buffed, especially since I’ve played maybe 3 matches on him … but not at the cost of the Engineer.

NevirSayDie.6235:

I feel for you. Nothing feels quite like your own personal niche build getting steamrolled by a poorly-thought-out rework to something that may have been overpowered when used a different way. I used to use flamethrower in my bunker build for the condition removal, but had to change after the KR nerf.

In hindsight, I don’t this Incendiary Powder nerf will be as bad as I thought.

Think about it: 4 seconds of Burning every 10 seconds. Flame Jet burns for 1 second at the end of every 2.25 second channel.

Together, that’s 8 seconds of Burning every 10 seconds. It’s not permanent by itself anymore, but the help of Blowtorch, Incendiary Ammo, Air Blast, and Napalm should be more than sufficient to sustain Burning damage on targets to take advantage of Flame Jet’s 10% damage increase.

Never mind the fact that having a Guardian in your group pretty much solves the issue entirely.

Incendiary Powder will still be worth taking, and you won’t need the Flame Turret either. I apologize for getting out of hand about it.

As for the nerf overall, I definitely have to dial back the hysteria and say that it was actually relatively well thought-out. The only kit that suffers from this is the Grenade Kit, which already has access to Chill, Poison, Blind, and Bleed.

With this change, the Bomb Kit and Flamethrower actually have a useable strength, and become more competitive DPS options in PvE. I think in the future ArenaNet should look to bring up the other kits rather than constantly bringing down the Grenade Kit, but at least on the PvE side of things … we might actually have more suitable build variety than previously seen. You may start seeing Conditioneers using the Flamethrower for its considerable Burning durations where they otherwise would have just used the Grenade Kit.

Just my final two cents on this topic. I’m going to refrain from commenting further about these changes and wait for the patch notes.

MrForz.1953:

Like Forty Seven Ninjas.6982:

(edit) Not related to what i said before, but where the heck is our 20% cooldown reduction for our turrets!?

Retrieving your turret will give you that.

Lol well then, i suppose i did know that. Nevermind! I guess we’ll just have to see how the new patch plays out.

Phineas Poe.3018:

Think about it: 4 seconds of Burning every 10 seconds. Flame Jet burns for 1 second at the end of every 2.25 second channel.

Together, that’s 8 seconds of Burning every 10 seconds. It’s not permanent by itself anymore, but the help of Blowtorch, Incendiary Ammo, Air Blast, and Napalm should be more than sufficient to sustain Burning damage on targets to take advantage of Flame Jet’s 10% damage increase.

I’ve noticed everyone talking about the 4s burning but no one seem to have notice that it’s a condition. which duration can be increased, potentially keeping it 100% uptime for all you blowtorch/FT lovers :P

Seriously? seriously? what the..
what?

Just listen to their selling talk about healing turret changes. ‘People are going to protect the turret’ yea right..

’It’s going to do some nice regen when it’s on the ground’ → WHAWIFDYAG@#( THE TURRET BREAKS IN 4 SECONDS WHEN IT’S DROPPED. THAT’S WHY PEOPLE PICK IT UP SO FAST.

How do you diversify a build, by nerfing a IP? What? that’s like saying: ‘I want to bake a lovely cake, so that’s why I’m going to lick my shoe’→ It just doesn’t make sense!

Seriously. I can’t take the bullkitten anymore. I can’t.

Chaba.5410:

redslion.9675:

Problem is: will healing turret’s radius be long enough to actually let it be put OUT of the point and still be healed?

This is the problem with mortar as well. If the range were longer, there would not be much of a need to up the survivability. As is, it needs to be able to stay standing under AoE barrage.

Frankly, I think the mortar first off needs a severe range increase, a zoom out camera angle, and a damage boost. I would settle for just the range increase to see how it works out before the others though.

google.3709:

Phineas Poe.3018:

Think about it: 4 seconds of Burning every 10 seconds. Flame Jet burns for 1 second at the end of every 2.25 second channel.

Together, that’s 8 seconds of Burning every 10 seconds. It’s not permanent by itself anymore, but the help of Blowtorch, Incendiary Ammo, Air Blast, and Napalm should be more than sufficient to sustain Burning damage on targets to take advantage of Flame Jet’s 10% damage increase.

I’ve noticed everyone talking about the 4s burning but no one seem to have notice that it’s a condition. which duration can be increased, potentially keeping it 100% uptime for all you blowtorch/FT lovers :P

Yeah its the same as before except that now it puts less pressure on the enemy by making it easier to remove the burning a longer time instead of having it reapplied right away.

I havnt had a chance to watch the sotg yet, and I’m on my phone atm, but I have to know what this sigil to battle change is! I see everyone talking about it, but what’s the actual change?

Not related to what i said before, but where the heck is our 20% cooldown reduction for our turrets!?

Seriously, this would be a massive boost in turret viability.

However, about the incendiary power trait… sigil of intelligence would make it work also with non-crit builds.

nakoda.4213:

but what about heals over time, anet? regen is all but useless until you let our turrets scale with our stats!

What are you talking about? Turrets scale both with Healing Power and Condition Damage…

healing power and condition image are secondary stats.

what about power, toughness, vita, etc etc?

Healing turret: like previous turret buffs, this buff is nice but inadequate, in particular it fails to address the fundamental problem of lack of survival in AoE. (Healing Turret, another expensive but high quality explosive bought to you by Turret Inc. – maybe that’s how turrets are meant to be used, but they’re generally too expensive and trait distribution too high)

Incendiary Powder: yet again a nerf to Grenade builds that hurts less powerful builds (e.g. FT) more! (Hoping against hope that this nerf is PvP specific.)

Elixir S: exploit removed – that’s reasonable. (It only hurts because of our weaknesses in other areas.)

Once again, the nerfs look like they outweigh the buffs.

How was Elixir S and exploit?

Are we supposed to have completely equal skills in every area with other professions?
If thts the case I can think of some other classes skills that should be brought down/up to ours.

Should the Ranger Minor Trait Natural Vigor be moved up to a GM like Adrenaline Implant or vise versa?
That is an argument that has already been made and the defense was that because everything else was different with the profession there was a reason why one is better than the other.

I can think of alot of things that Ele’s have over Engineers that would warrant us being able to use Utility Skills while under Elixir S.
Like someone else already said maybe our downed #2 needs to get switched to drink Elixir S.

Otherwise any arguements about how its just not fair we have a skill that is better than other ppls skill is just BS. Keep feeding the Devs stupid decisions!

CriSPeH.8512:

How was Elixir S and exploit?

Are we supposed to have completely equal skills in every area with other professions?
If thts the case I can think of some other classes skills that should be brought down/up to ours.

Should the Ranger Minor Trait Natural Vigor be moved up to a GM like Adrenaline Implant or vise versa?
That is an argument that has already been made and the defense was that because everything else was different with the profession there was a reason why one is better than the other.

I can think of alot of things that Ele’s have over Engineers that would warrant us being able to use Utility Skills while under Elixir S.
Like someone else already said maybe our downed #2 needs to get switched to drink Elixir S.

Otherwise any arguements about how its just not fair we have a skill that is better than other ppls skill is just BS. Keep feeding the Devs stupid decisions!

Good point!
You caught me making the same mistake the Devs seem to be making of looking simplistically at the skill. I’d just assumed Elixir S was meant to be an escape skill only and therefore doing anything else with it was an exploit. – My bad!

As you imply, the skill should be looked at in the context of the overall class. In which case, why wouldn’t Eng’s build some extra utility into the skill? Other classes have survival skills that allow them other actions while they’re active (e.g Ele’s Obsidian Flesh instant cast 5s invulnerabilty) So, why not Eng’s?

^
I didnt intend to sound mean or really direct my answer at you personally cuz I know alot of ppl have to same view.
And I apologize for the last remark since it was pretty kittenish.

But it just really bothers me that the Devs themselves seem to balance certain things in this 1 for 1 type way but other things are given a pass because they are just something unique to the profession.

Engineers are running out of things that are unique to the profession and having one of the best Stunbreakers (minor accomplishment) is about to be another one gone.
Soon we will just have the Gift of Opportunity which we will bestow on our enemies each time we shrink down and tell them to count to 3.