Guild Wars 2

I have been recently leveling up my engineer and i am currently level 33. I have realized though that i hardly use my weapon skills (i run p/p) and spend most of my time swapping between grenades bombs and healing kit. is this usual or should i learn to make more use of p/p?

You should make no use of p/p in PvE :P in general every ¹ skill is terrible on the engi (except kits). So you mainly should use bombs for damage, later grenades (there is a trait that grants +50% grenades thrown (lv60)) and just use the main weapon for some burst or combo fields.

You should run either Pistol/Shield or Rifle.
The rifle is for aoe damage and some nice cc, you can hold, or make space against bosses with 2 and 4 and against groups 3 and 5 deal a very high amount of dmg.
The pistol is just for 2 in short range combat for some single target burst. You may throw 3 in since it’s nearly instant.
The shield gives you some utility → 5 is a nice line stun and 4 reflects projectiles and acts as a combo finisher.

So in general you cast your big ol’bomb, then the firebomb (firefield) and if the field is active, double cast shield 4. So you got 2 combo finisher explosion, spreading might buffs to everyone. I also recommend the elixier gun for condition removal to allies and another explosion finisher aswell a heal field.

Any questions?

thank you very much very helpful! I was also wandering what trait lines i should spec into?

Also take into account that p/s allows you to use two sigils, rifle just one. Are they going to change that someday? Please?

That’s the same as a warrior using a greatsword as opposed to s/h.. So I doubt they will change that…

Well, I really hope they do somedays. It really makes no sense for me to have just 1 sigil in a weapon that isn’t stronger at all. However I still sometimes use the rifle for some pulls and jumps. But in general a pistol with battle sigil (+3 stacks might for 20 sec on weapon swap wich includes swapping kits! (10 sec cd) = 6 stacks permamight) and a 5% damage sigil on the shield outdamages the rifle already. Rifle would be sigil of battle too. The 5% of the shield affect all your bombs, grenades what ever But I sometimes like to loose 5% damage just for … well … fun with the rifle

Traits? Yes there are important or useful traits. I don’t know anymore where they are but some like:

• cuase vulnerability when you crit (!!!)
• +50% granades thrown
• +10% explosive damage
• +50% bomb radius <3
• gain 5 sec vigor when you get swiftness
  combined with
• gain 10 sec swiftness when changing kits
  or
• gain 5 sec swiftness when you crit (?% change)

That’s the most important stuff.

Xyonon.3987:

The shield gives you some utility -> 5 is a nice line stun and 4 reflects projectiles and acts as a combo finisher.

Meh, hard CC has too short a duration to be useful in PVE.

The blast finisher and reflect has some utility tho. But i find that i just as often go P/P for the additional burn, if i use pistols at all.

hm … +105 power / condition damage for the whole party or burn …
hm … 2x interruption of a strong attak or hold – pretty even here
hm … reflection or … nothing?
hm … block or … nothing?

my opinion ^^

Dependent on a fire field being up, and the burn has half the recharge time.
Noted, tho interrupts means bupkis against anything big (hello Defiant).
3 sec reflect, 30 recharge. Just about the only real benefit shield has. But it does not block melee attacks and it roots.
2 sec block, 40 sec recharge, no ability to attack while blocking.

Note btw that the guy was pretty much still leveling.

• Bomb 2 is a fire field.
• to reduce Defiant by 2 is pretty ok imo, also there are other annoying mobs like fire shaman flamethrower guys who suffer from an interruption

If I had a pistol offhand I just wouldn’t use it, bomb 1 deals more damage than the whole burn and bomb 5 is the same as the pistol 5 just bigger. However you can never have enough stuns and explosions.

As digiowl said I am still leveling so I’m not looking for optimisation I’m just looking for the best all round pve/dungeon leveling weapons/traits

you should swap to your weapon occasionally. static shot chain blinds, blowtorch is huge damage, and glue shot can help with kiting. play the class like an ele sort of. use skills, swap kits, use skills, swap kits, etc.

Yup for leveling p/p is pretty ok. Also since you only have 1 or 2 stats instead of 3 on your equip, the condition damage scales pretty well compared to berserker (power/precision/critdmg).