Guild Wars 2

So, what do engineer players think needs to be done to mortar to make it a more attractive option.

It stands out to me as a skill that was designed for large WvW fights, or shelling a point in PvP.

The latter is never going to happen. PvP requires too much mobility for rooting yourself in place (in an area that is NOT the capture point) long enough to make use of the skills. And the opportunity cost is too high. An AoE stun from supply crate is simply more versatile and destructive to enemy teams.

In WvW, fights aren’t static enough to make use of it due to its 1,400 range (1,500 when traited with elite supplies). Even then, grenades will deal more damage in this scenario, at greater (or the same) range. You’ll find a nice spot, root yourself, then the enemy zerg moves out of range, or starts coming too close. You now have to leave your mortar, whether to pursue the enemy or run away.

Personally, I think that mortar needs two changes for sure:
1) Increase the range. Something engineers have been asking for a lot. The thing is, I don’t know to what. Would 2000 range be over-powered? It IS a mortar, and the shots have a travel time…

2) The INTERRUPTABLE ability to reposition. In my view, when you place a mortar, you should be able to pick it up instantly and move to where you want to go. To place it, there should be a cast time of 1.5 seconds. This is to prevent engineers from using it as an insta-stability “get-out-of-incoming-CC” tool when a warrior 700 range away is about to earthshaker you, since you have perma-stability when you man the mortar. It would be really OP if it wasn’t interruptable, and the mortar shouldn’t really have any positive points in a close-quarters fight. Picking it up should be like picking up any bundle. You lose all of your weapon skills, and only have a 1 ability which grants swiftness to you for 10 seconds.

Maybe a damage increase on mortar 1 would help, but I’m not too sure.

On another note, I did find a nice use for it. I was helping a friend with the personal story mission where you take back claw island. I set the mortar down, and would man it every time the dragon at the end would use his fearing shout, or if the zombie fish things tried to suck me in. It’s pretty convenient, because 8s on a fear with zero follow-up kind of makes for a boring fight.

So what do you guys think, especially for PvP/WvW? You probably know already that mortar isn’t useful at all in PvE, and never will be in this meta, but suggestions from PvEcentric engineers would be cool.

A reduced cooldown (90 seconds?) and indestructability would help it I think. Adding a few seconds to #3 would do well also, or change #3 to a 5 second healing water field.
Probably remove the stability on use to balance it out.

2000-2500 range
3xtimes more damage (right now mortar damage are just a joke, fireworks deal more damage)
+10k mortar HP
+10-20% shots radius

It will not be op with this. Cause u still will need to stand in 1 position. beeing easy target for enemie.

The main reason I dislike the mortar is actually the grenade kit. A traited grenade kit serves the same purpose, but has a better range and allows the engineer to keep moving. The only way I’d see mortar become viable is if its range exceeded that of grenade kit. Either that, or turning it into some sort of ‘super turret’ that fires on its own.

It needs crazy range, absurd damage, and a lower cd so I can post up on hills and cliff sides lying in wait for passerby’s to rain hellfire upon.
\o/

I think a lot of Mortar’s problems could be solved by making it a kit instead of an environmental weapon. Same functionality but it can be picked up and repositioned easily and can’t be destroyed before you can do anything with it. Could probably use more range and/or damage with that even but just being able to use it on demand would help a lot imo.

yea the mortar just isn’t very elite but you can use it for a long time maby change the mortar to a kit

One thought would be to change the mortar into more of a bigger version of the charr racial elite artillery barrage. Give it a few charges and let the engineer call down artillery.

To compensate, the engineer could get a “radio” icon overhead to show enemies whos calling in the airstrikes.

Another option is to make the actual mortar/artillery a targetable “turret”, so you can either go after the engineer calling in the artillery or be sneaky, get behind enemy lines, and kill off the mortar itself. This would also enhance the thing in PvE, since even if the engineer is defeated someone else can use the mortar and get the buff instead.

The whole rooting yourself in place thing seems very dated, considering how much the game favors mobility.

three suggestions, pick one.

A. -reduce the cooldown and duration to 60 sec or less. allowing an unload, reposition, repeat gameplay.

B. -replace a skill with an aoe knockback skill that centers on the mortar allowing some deffense.

C. -replace a skill with a “reverse loaded shell” it would work similar to rifle 5 allowing the player to move locations. (as a bonus it could have a countdown that would give other players a time window to “grab on” for the ride" Functioning similarly to mesmer’s portal but only as a one way trip)

better yet make mortar a kit give nades 30-50% damage buff and make them our elite instead of stability give it 10s quickness

I say make the mortar an unmanned turret just like the other turrets. Have the overcharge be the 5 skill barrage. This way its added dps instead of manning the turrets and losing dps.

I don’t know what the mortar needs specifically, but I know it’s currently a mite lackluster. It could use some improvements.

The mortar needs to become a kit. Being able to put it down and pick it up and no cooldown.

A part of me wants to say that the mortar skill should create an actual siege weapon mortar, but I know that the imbalance would be too strong with this one.

The Concussion Barrage (no. 5 skill) has a pretty deceptively large radius. I’ve used it to some effect in WvW in order to push people off siege or split a group up. Luckily, my current zerg build has some space for the Elite Supplies trait. I agree it could use some love.

I do like the the kit idea, but we do also need a elite turret even though mortar becoming a turret would be too similar rocket turret. Really do not think lowering the cd would help much, maybe adding a few seconds of invulnerability after placing it to you and the mortar. But yes it needs a range increase, maybe rival rangers distance.

2200-2500 range or more is needed no arguing this

other than that buff main attack damage as it stands its a joke for wvw and pvp
same goes for number 3 heal even on full cleric it fails doesnt even cure conditions i think so yeah only number 5 skill is worth a kitten

So many things wrong with the mortar. It can’t be a mini piece of siege equipment (that would be great though) so a kit seems like the best alternative.

One thing I would really like to see is it hit far more than 5 targets (maybe 15 given it is an elite).

Everything people have covered here is true. It needs some sort of damage reduction to be useful because it turns you into a target (as it should). It needs a lot more range and at the very least more damage than a grenade kit.

I know that turrets need love in the form of durability and damage. However it doesn’t seem as though the experimental turrets trait will affect mortar

like i said in similar thread: make it mobile

What if it was made into being essentially just for deploying combo fields

1. Dark field
2. Smoke field
3. Water field
4. Ice field
5. Lightning field

Nice to see this being discussed again. If you folks would like some extra ideas, a thread about this was made about 2 months ago that I participated in.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/balance/PvX-Engineer-Mortar/first

Hope this helps in the discussion.

Engineer mortar should have been done like Horrik from Fractals. A shoulder mounted mortar/cannon that allows the engineer to remain mobile, able to use it for a certain amount of time before it “overheats” or even making it an elite kit with the drawback of reducing movement speed etc, whatever. Point is: Non-stationary shoulder mounted cannon/mortar.

Make it happen, A-net.

Crion.8465:

Engineer mortar should have been done like Horrik from Fractals. A shoulder mounted mortar/cannon that allows the engineer to remain mobile, able to use it for a certain amount of time before it “overheats” or even making it an elite kit with the drawback of reducing movement speed etc, whatever. Point is: Non-stationary shoulder mounted cannon/mortar.

Make it happen, A-net.

I was just about to post the exact same thing.
I’d settle with it being an elite skill Launcher Kit with the same skills.
The animations are already there, at least for male Norn. It could also use the same model but with blue lights instead of red.

I’m not a big fan of kits, but Mortar as a kit doesn’t sound half bad. It would give long range-potential without having to trait into grenades, and not rooting you in place hoping your enemy won’t move.

Mortar-Kit should not be a kit by default, but a new Grandmaster trait in Inventions turning Mortar into a Kit would be amazing. Unlike our other kits, as an Elite there should be a cooldown between switching IN and OUT of it, locking you in or out of the kit. By locking you into MortarKit or a short time it will help balance the abilities to be more “elite”

Crion.8465:

Engineer mortar should have been done like Horrik from Fractals. A shoulder mounted mortar/cannon that allows the engineer to remain mobile, able to use it for a certain amount of time before it “overheats” or even making it an elite kit with the drawback of reducing movement speed etc, whatever. Point is: Non-stationary shoulder mounted cannon/mortar.

Make it happen, A-net.

Yes

Crion.8465:

Engineer mortar should have been done like Horrik from Fractals. A shoulder mounted mortar/cannon that allows the engineer to remain mobile, able to use it for a certain amount of time before it “overheats” or even making it an elite kit with the drawback of reducing movement speed etc, whatever. Point is: Non-stationary shoulder mounted cannon/mortar.

Make it happen, A-net.

Yes :O

Make this a GM trait making the mortar an elite kit, which we can switch into freely but with all skills on a long CD. I think that would be fair.

Indeed that’d would be really great. I’d even accept a CD of the kit for lets say 10-30 sec. But I guess having the kit skills on CD is enough.

Mortar Kit – heh – I like it.

Crion.8465:

Engineer mortar should have been done like Horrik from Fractals. A shoulder mounted mortar/cannon that allows the engineer to remain mobile, able to use it for a certain amount of time before it “overheats” or even making it an elite kit with the drawback of reducing movement speed etc, whatever. Point is: Non-stationary shoulder mounted cannon/mortar.

Make it happen, A-net.

I never thought of this but OH MY GOD IT IS SO BEAUTIFUL.

DO IT, DO IT, DO IT A-NET!

Crion.8465:

Engineer mortar should have been done like Horrik from Fractals. A shoulder mounted mortar/cannon that allows the engineer to remain mobile, able to use it for a certain amount of time before it “overheats” or even making it an elite kit with the drawback of reducing movement speed etc, whatever. Point is: Non-stationary shoulder mounted cannon/mortar.

Make it happen, A-net.

Yep, I’ve ben thinking the same. Except that I think you could do it like conjure weapons but then otherwise and only one for you ofcourse. But like charge-wise. Every attack uses a charge. But going upwards instead of downwards. Starting at “1 stack of weapon heat”, going up to a maximum of ~25. When reaching 25 your weapon is going on cooldown (hahahaha).
This could sync very well with the elite skill trait, giving you more skills (~30 or 35?) to make it overheat.

I’ve also been thinking about a sharpshooter like kit. Been brainstorming a bit. The idea is that is also uses the overheat mechanic, but it is sniping :P

#1: Scope shot: Aim at your foe and take a high damage dealing shot. Dealing more damage on longer range. 1.1/4 cast time
#2: ….
Okay I can’t really think of much more. Maybe adding some skill which allows you to make some sort of trap. Adding some stealth maybe in it.

Just putting out some ideas here

To be honest, a rpg or javelin style kit could fit as an entire new elite, mortar i think should just be improved until it is a threat to be worth countering. I like the idea of our own personal siege weapon, its just that it got such a minuscule range. I say let the mortar work with rifled turret barrels again (50% range) add a 400 range atleast instead of 100 on elite supplies and make the base range 1600. That way we could actually spec to counter siege in wvw which is its primary market. And we would also then get a 35% bonus to the damage from traits.

Because the range is the most critical thing about it.

I would love o see mortar companies in wvw laying siege to everything. ^^

Oh and i would have loved to see more disruptive skills on the mortar, we got a bit of an overlap with both chill and cripple, two types i’m missing is a smoke shell similar to the old smokebomb and a large aoe poison gas shell.

What if caltrops where made into a larger aoe Toxic gas shell which applied 2 seconds of poison and the bleeding of caltrops mortar in each pulse (tune the recharge) allowing us to pressure zergs and points by dampening their healing and putting pressure. And what if the chill shot applied a second of blind every now and then, protecting that area defensively, or maybe the heal could pulse protection tequatl style?

Overpowered like heck probably but no one uses it seriously as it is now.

The problem with making an entirely new elite means that every other class needs to get a new elite as well which means they’ll need to come up with these new elites, design them, balance etc which would take far longer than just changing mortar from immobile to mobile.

An immobile mortar will likely never be a threat simply because it is immobile, and being immobile in WvW, or anywhere, likely means death because mobility means survival. It might have some small use on walls in sieges or shooting onto walls but that’s a very small use and an elite skill shouldn’t be so useless at everything except in one situation in one part of the game, that’s my opinion at least.

Imho, the mortar should have two major improvements:
One regarding the range – it should be far more high (something like 1700/2000 when traited, or even 1850/2100) and less dependant on line of sight – the projectile comes from above, after all.
And one regarding its useability – putting the mortar should have something like 2 or 3 seconds cast time, and if an engineer is using it, the elite skills changes in a sort of pickup option (with a time of something like 4 seconds, interruptable if the engineer gets damage) that gives back the skill fully charged.
Basically, it gives enemies a way to destroy the mortar (putting it in full cooldown) with a good-executed action, while still allowing mobility to the engineer (that can pickup the mortar to move away if he isn’t currently fighting or if he wants to escape because enemies are coming, assuming they’ve been spotted far enough).

Crion.8465:

The problem with making an entirely new elite means that every other class needs to get a new elite as well which means they’ll need to come up with these new elites, design them, balance etc which would take far longer than just changing mortar from immobile to mobile.

An immobile mortar will likely never be a threat simply because it is immobile, and being immobile in WvW, or anywhere, likely means death because mobility means survival. It might have some small use on walls in sieges or shooting onto walls but that’s a very small use and an elite skill shouldn’t be so useless at everything except in one situation in one part of the game, that’s my opinion at least.

Well given that we got heal skills and then new grandmaster traits its not hard to imagine elites might be next (1 new elite per class instead of 1 new utility for every category).

Also i have nothing against situational skills, its just that they need to be really shining in those scenarios where they can be used.