Guild Wars 2

I made an engi to learn how to better fight them in spvp and noticed something I don’t think I have ever seen on any other class – the flamethrower trait + the HP/sec while equipped w/a kit and scrapper’s might while you have stab trait.

All this coupled with the engineers multitude of other survival traits/skills and Flamethrower’s DPS/cc/and blast combos in just one kit, makes engineer feel more tank-y than the tanks from the other armor classes.

How is this balanced/not op, because I’m just not seeing it.

The flamethrower stability is good, but you have to pretty much camp FT to get much more than the odd safe-stomp from it. And camping any one kit kills the Engi’s real strength, which is flexibility and adaptation.

The HP regen is not all that different from other class mechanics (Adrenal Health, Virtue of Resolve, Shadows Rejuvenation), and again you need to stay in kits to benefit. Most engineers will need to spend at least some time on their main weapon to fight effectively.

True, our might stacking is good, I won’t argue with that. But other classes are now able to stack might pretty effectively (Reapers); I suppose the main argument is that the Scrapper might stacking is essentially ‘free’, at least the old fire-blast & HGH required popping some cooldowns to build stacks. But again, you now have things like Heralds that get (near) free might stacking.

The disadvatage is you need to be in flamethrower to get all the stab and might stack, if you switch kit/weapon stab is gone and might does not stack further. If you stay only in flamethrower you will not be very effective.

Its very nice/convenient in open world pve – but as stated, you just do nothing but stack might and stab – which is not enough for any other game mode.

If they nerfed flamer then it would once again be useless.

Also don’t forget that keeping FT up makes Engi kill itself from Retaliation almost instantly.

Because the Flamethrower, especially it’s autoattack, has kitten damage.

I only use FT for loot tagging. Even without might and stab, it’s the most OP tag weapon next to guardian staff. Beyond that, even with 25 stacks of might the FT feels really slow to kill things. Two hits with my hammer in a second often does more damage than the FT in 2¼ seconds. You also need to connect all the hits, which depending on what you’re doing might not be possible. For condineers, the toolbelt skill is really strong, but also has a heavy CD.

There are however good applications for using FT juggernaut though. The perma stab helps you achieve in-game objectives that others would struggle with (I’m thinking of that flower/bloom mission in Auric Basin).

am I missing something? It doesn’t seem to go above 12 stacks on its own.

StabbyCakes.8736:

am I missing something? It doesn’t seem to go above 12 stacks on its own.

If you build for it (Firearms 231, Alchemy 121, Scrapper 331 with Hoelbrak runes), MM/Jugg can grant you permanent Swiftness, Vigor, Stability, 18+ Might and -60% condition duration in combat, with very high up-time on Fury, Protection and Retaliation depending on your other utilities.

The problem is that only FT 2 and 3 are meaningfully strong compared to grenades or even the hammer, and while you can flicker FT every 3 seconds to keep stability ticking, you’re still sacrificing a utility, a few traits and a section of your mind for it.

It’s good for open world PvE and I use it for roaming with a friend, but Might stacks aren’t everything when we have better abilities tied to equally viable stun breaks.