Rifle, pistol & pistol or pistol & shield?
Can’t let go of my shield.
Using 2 defensive skills in a very offensive manner just is too appealing for me.
I’ve always been a more defensive player, never glass canon, but the shield gives me the freedom to be aggressive with the abilities too!
Throwing the shield in a group, using it to stun or daze.
Reflecting to hit the ranged, not just save yourself.
Knocking back…
My only gripe are the cooldowns.
I can’t always spend 20 points just on that, and the cooldowns are only ‘acceptable’ if traited.
Both of them need to be lowered somewhat.
The shield’s cooldowns are what keep me from using it. And the traits are buried in a tree that I never go into.
I use P/P cuz I roll heavy on conditions. Pistol offhand gives he a hard hitting attack, burning, and an immob/crip. Can’t beat it.
[TTBH] [HATE], Yak’s Bend(NA)
I use shield and pistol because of two reasons, the first being that I can never use the rifle because the quip is much cooler than the rifle legendary, and two because the shield can counter a thief so easily, your 4 knocks them out of the Shadow Refuge, and if they try to back stab you just 5 and they’re stunned. I feel naked without my shield!
Pistol/Pistol makes me feel stronger with the powerful Burn damage on it, but I love Pistol/Shield. Really fits my playstyle a lot more especially being able to swap kits. Not too stoked about having to go 20 into a tree to get a trait for shield, but what can you do…electric throwing shield = awesome.
I leveled with P/S and focused on conditions. I loved throwing my shield but things took a long time to die. I tried rifles for a bit and didn’t like it. I wasn’t until I hit 80, I realized how great P/P was for conditions.
Rifle, because the mainhand pistol is so god-awful in PvE (bar traited farming), and the offhand shield, while amazing, can’t compare to blunderbuss and jump shot for offensive purposes, let alone net shot being a root with incredibly high overall uptime (2.5 second duration, 8s cooldown, melee bosses are drastically easier~).
Rifle hands down, the pistols are a joke, and bad ones at that.
I have two engi’s. One with a rifle. One with a pistol/shield. I starte out wishing they had weapon swap hten I just ahd to make another.
I was a fan of going with P/P and stacking up the Condi DMG, and the CC was nice. But I would say for leveling purposes the Rifle is your best bet, because of the Clean DMG it can do, and the abilities of the Rifle are great.
https://www.twitch.tv/amazinphelix
Im stuck between Rifle and P/S. I like how I can net shot then jump shot into an enemy then follow up with blunderbuss and overcharged in a neat row. However I like the defensiveness of the shield.
In practice though Ive been using bomb and nade kits for *~@"s and giggles. Circling an enemy throwing nades at them and dropping that big ol’ bomb.
I love the shield. I think it is one of the most powerful weapons in the game, especially considering it has just 2 skills. One skill gives you a reflect, knockback, and blast finisher. The other gives you a long daze with 2 interrupts, block (which you can use while you do other things!!!), stun, and projectile finisher. I don’t think you can find 2 other weapon skills in the game that give you that much utility. This is the reason I am choosing to make Flameseeker Prophecies as my legendary.
If I could equip two shields I would!
Jade Quarry
I like pistol/shield. It has nice defense and is just plain fun. Rifle is also great with it’s controls. I’m underwhelmed by pistol/pistol, even though it is effective. I just don’t like it.
(edited by danbuter.2314)
I love the shield. I think it is one of the most powerful weapons in the game, especially considering it has just 2 skills. One skill gives you a reflect, knockback, and blast finisher. The other gives you a long daze with 2 interrupts, block (which you can use while you do other things!!!), stun, and projectile finisher. I don’t think you can find 2 other weapon skills in the game that give you that much utility. This is the reason I am choosing to make Flameseeker Prophecies as my legendary.
If I could equip two shields I would!
Dual shields would be a dream come true. I wish more games had that option.
RIFLE!
Lots of control over you’re enemy… after you bounce them around for a while and kill them, some will tell you, how and when you’re going to die and describe it with epic detail follow by an ignore and screenshot to anet!
Pistol/Shield for small scale engagements, the shield’s control effects and the pistol’s conditions are too good for a drawn out 1v1
Rifle for large-scale engagements, the range and high burst damage allow you to finish single targets quickly and move on to a different position, and allow you to chase people down better
I don’t get Pistol/Pistol but then again I run Flamethrower Kit as my main skill so IDK
Rifle all the way.
3.5k hip shot, I don’t know how much damage I do with the static discharge, because I see overlapping 2k and 3k everywhere on my screen.
And the predator is 100 times sexier than quip. All I need is the flippn’ precursor and I’m done. I accept donations lolololol
I like the look of pistol/shield, but feel that i am hampering myself damage-wise unless i run rifle.
I believe the Pistol #1 fires too slowly for its specs (same with Thief, and I think it’s a bug), which renders P/x somewhat inferior to Rifle in general. Since they have different niches, it can still have its uses, but until they fix that I think I’d have to say Rifle is better.
Never mind that while a hylek can produce a perfect stream of darts using a blowgun(!), pistol #2 can barely hit a barn wall outside of melee range.
I used to play P/P in PvP and WvW. It’s true that P/P condition build is more efficient: you have more stats from 2 pistols and 2 sigils. But I switch to rifle because I want more direct damage. I don’t want to tank, kite, burn, glue, poison, etc. It’s not really my type to toy with my opponents. So I went full berserker with static discharge build and sigil of air (to add another 2000 damage lightning every 5 seconds as a joke).