Guild Wars 2

I don’t know man. Some of these changes make me sad too (R.I.P. SSRB, PowerWrench|StaticDischarge both at Adept). But at the same time, I’m way too excited for the rest. Many people are looking at our changes and are calling us ANet’s golden child.

At what point in the history of this game have we ever felt this way? When they buffed turrets and told us we weren’t playing the class the way they wanted us to? Nah man. I’m gonna bathe in this.

Let us not also forget, the Devs themselves have said Engineer was the hardest and has always been the hardest to work with in terms of balance and changes. I don’t know why, but if I took a guess I’d say it is due to their niche and weird mechanics compared to other skill bars.

This means they not only skimped out on the initial presentation, but once more complete felt the need to make up for it in this 2nd one. I believe they more than rose to that challenge.

PistolWhip.2697:

Let us not also forget, the Devs themselves have said Engineer was the hardest and has always been the hardest to work with in terms of balance and changes. I don’t know why, but if I took a guess I’d say it is due to their niche and weird mechanics compared to other skill bars.

I find it to be the exact opposite. They aren’t just balancing usefulness, but identity. As Engineers, we are stepping on the identity lines of every profession at the same time. Every other profession is more like a “niche” compared to the Engineer in terms of design. Even now, if you ask people “What is the _ profession supposed to do?”, Engineer is the hardest to answer. If you asked me that, I’d tell you “anything”. The ‘identity’ of a profession is relative to its perceived role. But the best thing about Engineer, or at least how I play with them, is how they just fill in blanks. We’re the RAMIREZ of GW2 Professions. Access to just about every condition, boon, and field type in the game but we’re not allowed to shine brightest in anything outside of the sheer number of blast finishers it can create for them. A jack of all trades profession in a game where EVERY profession is supposed to be able to fulfill multiple roles. However, while the other professions have much clearer roles that they can follow and do well in, in some other roles they don’t shine as much. But an Engineer can compensate for an entire additional role just by adding a single kit into their skill bar.

And that’s where the delicate line of balance comes in. You don’t want an Engineer to outshine a class in its most prominent role. Many people play Thief to do massive damage in subtlety. But if Engineers somehow were the class doing this more effectively, those players will just switch to Engineer instead and the Thief is stripped of its identity as the covert assassin profession.
At the same time, you also don’t want the Engineer to be subpar in that role either. Because if you did, it’s as if it’s not meant to be effective in that role at all and Engineers would focus more towards other roles. and the “Jack of All Trades” moniker wouldn’t mean anything.

Nilix.2170:

PistolWhip.2697:

Let us not also forget, the Devs themselves have said Engineer was the hardest and has always been the hardest to work with in terms of balance and changes. I don’t know why, but if I took a guess I’d say it is due to their niche and weird mechanics compared to other skill bars.

I find it to be the exact opposite. They aren’t just balancing usefulness, but identity. As Engineers, we are stepping on the identity lines of every profession at the same time. Every other profession is more like a “niche” compared to the Engineer in terms of design. Even now, if you ask people “What is the _ profession supposed to do?”, Engineer is the hardest to answer. If you asked me that, I’d tell you “anything”. The ‘identity’ of a profession is relative to its perceived role. But the best thing about Engineer, or at least how I play with them, is how they just fill in blanks. We’re the RAMIREZ of GW2 Professions. Access to just about every condition, boon, and field type in the game but we’re not allowed to shine brightest in anything outside of the sheer number of blast finishers it can create for them. A jack of all trades profession in a game where EVERY profession is supposed to be able to fulfill multiple roles. However, while the other professions have much clearer roles that they can follow and do well in, in some other roles they don’t shine as much. But an Engineer can compensate for an entire additional role just by adding a single kit into their skill bar.

And that’s where the delicate line of balance comes in. You don’t want an Engineer to outshine a class in its most prominent role. Many people play Thief to do massive damage in subtlety. But if Engineers somehow were the class doing this more effectively, those players will just switch to Engineer instead and the Thief is stripped of its identity as the covert assassin profession.
At the same time, you also don’t want the Engineer to be subpar in that role either. Because if you did, it’s as if it’s not meant to be effective in that role at all and Engineers would focus more towards other roles. and the “Jack of All Trades” moniker wouldn’t mean anything.

I think you’re right actually. That makes much more sense than my theory.

In fact I like how well thought out your post is so I am going to +1 it.

The educating never ends.

I really like most of the changes. There are some that I am not all that happy about, but the new abilities/mechanics/skills that we are getting more than make up for the bad changes IMO.