P/P or rifle?
There are no pros or cons, since they don’t compete with each other…
Depending on your chosen traits/gear/utilities, you pick rifle for power/hybrid builds, P/P for offensive condi-builds and p/s for defensive condi/hybrid builds.
F.e. if you have toolkit in your bar, you have less reasons to run p/s since you already have a block, and therefore are not forced into shield anymore. Ofc it would still be a defensive advantage to still run p/s but as long as you have Toolkit, p/p will work fine as well.
Rifle is there to bring cc and dps for power-oriented builds, along with the option to effectively harass beyond 600~900 range (where nades and bombs are effectively useless)
So yea, there is no pros or cons to run any of them, unless your original question was how effective various build-types towards each other are…
Answer: They are all effectively useless for you, unless you find a (couple of) spec(s) that are really fun for you to play, so you have the motivation to master them.
So the counter-question is: what builds have you tried so far, and what was the most fun for you?
Engineer is love, Engineer is life.
you can level pistols. but they are woefully underpowered at 80. nearly unusable. Marginally viable in spvp, but thats it, and even then barely. And then p/s is generally better. Shield is generally the reason you run pistol mh in spvp.
There are no pros or cons, since they don’t compete with each other…
Depending on your chosen traits/gear/utilities, you pick rifle for power/hybrid builds, P/P for offensive condi-builds and p/s for defensive condi/hybrid builds.
F.e. if you have toolkit in your bar, you have less reasons to run p/s since you already have a block, and therefore are not forced into shield anymore. Ofc it would still be a defensive advantage to still run p/s but as long as you have Toolkit, p/p will work fine as well.
Rifle is there to bring cc and dps for power-oriented builds, along with the option to effectively harass beyond 600~900 range (where nades and bombs are effectively useless)
So yea, there is no pros or cons to run any of them, unless your original question was how effective various build-types towards each other are…
Answer: They are all effectively useless for you, unless you find a (couple of) spec(s) that are really fun for you to play, so you have the motivation to master them.
So the counter-question is: what builds have you tried so far, and what was the most fun for you?
Thank you! I guess im gonna go with p/p I enjoy condi damage.
P/P is not underpowered in spvp in my opinion. Now the meta ils rifle cele ok … but rabid P/P is till a strong setup for me . There are some match where i find cele rifle better … other p/p rabid. .. usually i switch depending on the opponent team composition
what should a cele build use? p/p p/s or rifle? (mostly wvw)
what should a cele build use? p/p p/s or rifle? (mostly wvw)
WvW ? Rifle.
The extra range, cc & immobilize are great for picking people off if your coordinate with allies.
I would be sure to bring a tool kit though for the blocks, or possibly an elixer S for the stunbreak/invuln and stealth.
After that I would say nades cause the range is frekin awesome, damage is decent & conditions are good for harassing people
if you roam P/P with nades , toolkit and eg is in my opinion a really good setup. I usually take rifle barrel to have more range on eg … usually camp in eg from far, then when people come melee to me i switch to pistol … for pistol 5,4 and then nades while it is immobilized. Obvioulsy against a condi necro it is really hard .. but it is hard with rifle also… it is only a matter of preference in my opinion. What i really miss , in PP and in rifle is bombs for stealthing … but i did not find a build with bombs, for roaming, better than nades. The only one viable for me is P/S with nades , bombs and a break stun ( eg, ss or elixir S or also rocket boost ) but i have problem playing without toolkit. Playing with bombs and toolkit let you without any range weapon . Obviously they are condi setup with rabid for P/P
here is the thing about the rifle…ability 2-5 are on such low CD that it is just outright better than P/P or P/S rifle has CD 10-10-15-20 where P/P has 10-15-15-30 and P/S has it the worst with 10-15-30-40 and that’s not all…the damage scaling from the pistol is so low from power that you’re just wasting the stat and condi isn’t much better since the autos only apply 2 sec of one stack of bleed so it doesn’t make up for it very well…i think its really stupid that they made the rifle the only viable weapon in pvp…I use P/S anyway since I enjoy its play style better and I like to be different but it’s really stupid how much worse it is than the rifle.
I agree with the statement that p/p skills are relatively lacking compared to rifle skills, and that’s coming from someone who chooses to use pistols. Even if you add in the condi damage, almost every pistol skill has a rifle skill that is superior to it (the one exception is Static Shot).
For example, Glue Shot is nice, but the Net Shot with the rifle is quicker, has twice the immobilize duration, and is much more difficult to evade. Sure, GS is unblockable and hits multiple targets, but the animation is so obvious and the immobilize is so short that you can barely get 2 grenades off IF you time it perfectly AND you’re in melee range. Often, the fact that it’s unblockable doesn’t help you, because most players will just dodge or avoid it and very rarely will you ever get an opportunity to hit more than 1 person with it. The only plus, IMO, to glue shot is you can use it to disengage by shooting a puddle behind you. If I had the opportunity to choose, I’d probably prefer Net Shot for most situations. The added cripple of glue shot is meh, since most players don’t remain in the puddle for very long IF they get hit by it at all.
Blow Torch is nice and can hit pretty hard for both condi and regular damage, but using Blunderbuss at max range hits just as hard as a Blow Torch in melee range. That doesn’t seem fair to me. Yes, the burning from BT does a lot more damage than the bleeds from BB, but until burning becomes stackable, it remains underwhelming to me.
Poison dart volley can be useful, but the mechanics of it frustrate me. If someone stealths, dodges, or shadowsteps right before or during the volley, the skill is wasted, as missing one shot with it almost always means the rest of the shots will miss, even if the target is within range and no longer stealthed. I usually expect to hit someone with 2/5 shots in most cases, and only use it to apply poison to people trying to run away and/or heal themselves and on downed enemies.
The icing on the cake, IMO, is the fact that with the rifle you get the condi cleanse and mobility of overcharged shot and jump shot, not to mention the CC knockback. I always run rocket boots with my p/p build because I know if I get immobilized and focused down I am as good as dead. I know elixir S and toolkit gear shield could be used in these situations, but I don’t like having 3 seconds where I can’t attack, even if I am invulnerable, because in a team fight, that’s a clear loss of dps. I think that with the new mechanics of mobile skills, ANet should change overcharged shot so that it does NOT cleanse any conditions, since those conditions won’t affect the skill in the future. It just seems a little too OP for an engi regular weapon skill.
Finally, my last beef with the p/p setup is that it’s used for a condi build, yet engi has a trait that applies blind with ONLY rifles. I cannot fathom the reasoning behind that, as rifle users are often at a safer distance, AND have additional mobility to boot.
So, yes, I am a p/p user, and I enjoy using the weapon set, but when I compare it to rifle in both theory and practice, I find rifle does just about everything that pistol does, just better. The one area in which pistols have a slight edge is in applying several different conditions in a very short amount of time, and this is why I use it for my build (along with the fact that, to me, it’s more fun).
This wouldn’t all fit in one reply, so here is the rest of my analysis:
I think the upcoming changes to conditions will help to bridge the gap between pistol and rifle, but I still think more will be needed to make the skills comparable in terms of the damage and utility they bring to the table, especially since rifle seems to synergize with so many more traits and skills.
The thing that bugs me the most is that if you want mobility, rifle is the weapon of choice, while if you’re running dual pistols, you’re practically a sitting duck unless you are willing to give up one of your precious utility slots. I know GW2 isn’t an FPS and there are a lot of things about the game that aren’t grounded in reality, but most weapon sets work the way one would expect (ie, hammer is a slow, close-range weapon that does a lot of knockback/stun/hard CC; sword has mobility and good single-target dps). Therefore, rifle attacks should be stronger, but slower, with higher cooldowns, while pistol attacks should be quicker and relatively weaker while giving the user more mobility and shorter cooldowns.
In summation:
Rifle:
More mobility AND condi cleanse
Higher regular damage (non-condi)
Shorter cooldowns
Longer range
More traits synergize w/ rifle builds
Better autoattack
Better burst
Pistol:
Better overall condi damage
More types of condis which can be applied relatively quickly
Ways to fix/balance:
Make rifle CDs longer/pistol CDs shorter
Remove condi cleanse from Overcharged Shot
Reduce cast time/increase immob duration of Glue Shot
Longer bleeds on pistol autoattack
“Go for the eyes” should work with pistol as well
Oh and when I mentioned the disparity between glue shot and net shot, I forgot to mention that net shot has 1/3 the cooldown. GG, net shot wins (and it’s not even close).
Why not try them out and see for yourself. I love both build equally they just excel at different things.
If i had to summarize i’d say cele rifle is a more rounded build that manages to do everything well, you can fight any class using it and it offers relatively good team support in that regard (jack of all trades), it also offers a lot of survivability through elixerS stealth and toolkit block + rifle leap that can be used offensively or defensively to create distance.
Rabids p/p Is often a stronger build in team fights due to bomb kits aoe condition fields, just remember to never fight a necromancer with it. Other than that theyre fairly similar. Also it is a much easier build to fight outnumbered fights with since you can just aoe condition every enemy on point compared to cele rifle that really only focuses on one target at a time.
these are my pvp builds
Cele rifle- http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fdAQFAUlUUpkrlYx+KseRCbBNqxAqNIyN2xPHhAkUA-TJhFABA8AAIa/BnKDg8FAAA
Rabid pp- http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fdAQJAqalUUpPrlYx+KseRCbBNqxAqNIyN2xP3gAkUA-TJhHAB8s/AAPAAkKDA8JAAA
(edited by SuicideFall.3697)
Why not try them out and see for yourself. I love both build equally they just excel at different things.
If i had to summarize i’d say cele rifle is a more rounded build that manages to do everything well, you can fight any class using it and it offers relatively good team support in that regard (jack of all trades), it also offers a lot of survivability through elixerS stealth and toolkit block + rifle leap that can be used offensively or defensively to create distance.Rabids p/p Is often a stronger build in team fights due to bomb kits aoe condition fields, just remember to never fight a necromancer with it. Other than that theyre fairly similar. Also it is a much easier build to fight outnumbered fights with since you can just aoe condition every enemy on point compared to cele rifle that really only focuses on one target at a time.
these are my pvp builds
Cele rifle- http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fdAQFAUlUUpkrlYx+KseRCbBNqxAqNIyN2xPHhAkUA-TJhFABA8AAIa/BnKDg8FAAA
Rabid pp- http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fdAQJAqalUUpPrlYx+KseRCbBNqxAqNIyN2xP3gAkUA-TJhHAB8s/AAPAAkKDA8JAAA
In your rabid P/P build you have no block or active defense. In a build like that would be better to take shield offhand ? Otherwise, for remaining P/P would not it better to trade bomb kit for toolkit ?