Guild Wars 2

I’ve got close to 1,300 hours on my little Asura Engineer (95% in WvW these days). And I’m the first to admit that kits and weapons that at first glance appear to be useless, later turn out to be indispensable (I’m looking at you EG and Took Kit).

I run P/P in a hybrid SD/Condition Duration build with Rampager armor, EG, Rifle Turret solely for Surprise Shot + SD, and Tool Kit.

I’ve experimented with the Shield, but I just can’t get past the long Cool Down timer.

I measure the effectiveness of a weapon by how much I actually use ALL of it. I ran with the Rifle for hundreds of hours, but eventually came to realize that the Jump Shot was something that I rarely employed. Sure, I could stomp someone with 6k of damage, but I rarely did in the chaos of WvW. And I also didn’t like the self-stun of the Overcharged Shot.

I know that the Shield has an almost cult following- but then again, so do cults.

What’s it’s charm? How can you even begin to justify the long CD? Is if for Tanky Builds only? Or fast, mobile glass cannon builds. Or is it- as I suspect – that everyone that uses a Shield is a grade-A wacko?

Shield is pretty good if:

1. You have a ton of burning in your build already, or you don’t use your main weapons for dps at all (the latter PvE only, really)
2. You have at least two kits, probably three—the more skills you have, the more you can afford long cooldowns
3. You are tanky.

I personally don’t use shield any more because I find burn too important to condition builds. It is a very fun weapon and useful in some situations, though.

Also, about jump shot: it’s certainly hard to use as a damage skill. It’s amazing with a smoke field, if you can find a way to use bomb kit or flame turret with it (I haven’t yet for WvW).

NevirSayDie.6235:

Shield is pretty good if:

1. You have a ton of burning in your build already, or you don’t use your main weapons for dps at all (the latter PvE only, really)
2. You have at least two kits, probably three—the more skills you have, the more you can afford long cooldowns
3. You are tanky.

I personally don’t use shield any more because I find burn too important to condition builds. It is a very fun weapon and useful in some situations, though.

Also, about jump shot: it’s certainly hard to use as a damage skill. It’s amazing with a smoke field, if you can find a way to use bomb kit or flame turret with it (I haven’t yet for WvW).

How do you know my thoughts exactly? Like all the time?

Also I will add though that shield #5 can provide a very clutch daze (which is our only daze attack) and a stun (something else we don’t have many of), which are moves that, in the hands of an adept player, can turn the tide of any 1v1 in their favor.

And the fact that #4 is a blast finisher means that if you take Heal Turret with you now, you can really stack on the water blast heals.

Also, Jump Shot is used better in burst builds and for quick movement if you take the trait to increase the range on your rifle. I typically only use it when I’ve knocked someone back into a corner, I will often jump shot to right in front of them, assuming they will move forward to get out… quite often it connects but in any sense, to me it’s more of a positional move that just happens to hit pretty well if someone gets in the way.

aydenunited.5729:

How do you know my thoughts exactly? Like all the time?

Because we’re both right, so out of necessity we hold the same opinions!

aydenunited.5729:

Also I will add though that shield #5 can provide a very clutch daze (which is our only daze attack) and a stun (something else we don’t have many of), which are moves that, in the hands of an adept player, can turn the tide of any 1v1 in their favor.

And the fact that #4 is a blast finisher means that if you take Heal Turret with you now, you can really stack on the water blast heals.

Also, Jump Shot is used better in burst builds and for quick movement if you take the trait to increase the range on your rifle. I typically only use it when I’ve knocked someone back into a corner, I will often jump shot to right in front of them, assuming they will move forward to get out… quite often it connects but in any sense, to me it’s more of a positional move that just happens to hit pretty well if someone gets in the way.

Word.

I mainly use the shield for the exstra blast heal from the healing turret, so between grenades and confusion i do more then enough damage that i dont need the pistol burn.

Im quited suprised at how many in WvW ignores a stack +5 confusion and bleeds, +10 if they forgot to evade my mine. Especially love it when a thief is doing that heartseeker jump thing. xD

The shield is awesome, but arguably it fits in better with builds that have grenade kit and/or bomb kit in them. Otherwise your dmg output would suffer due to a lack of burn. I can’t live without it now.

Its really simple, The pistol offhand is complete crap (Not a fan of pistol main hand either) so that alone makes it the only option.

But the projectile relfect + aoe knockback and the block/stun + throw daze (often double daze) come one, its great.

The double daze, and the ability to block and attack at the same time. The knock back, that doesn’t knock you on your kitten (Rifle i am looking at you). Reflecting a Warriors kill shot is hilarious as well.

I’m no guru on Engineers, but I don’t think burn, immob, and cripple can beat reflect + aoe knockback + blast finisher + block + stun + daze. The options are simply incredible with just 2 skills. In fact, I’m having trouble mastering the two skills because they’re so flexible (do I reflect now? do I save it for the kd to interrupt stomp? do I get an extra heal? etc etc).

But in the end I guess it’s more of a playstyle issue. I haven’t sincerely given P/P a try yet.

a stun when attacked (from stealth as well).
A ranged daze that hits on the way back too. And it hits multiple targets.

a reflect.

a pushback.

these are the obvious ones.

A blast finisher is great too.

Now you can start combining, as the above posts show. The healing combo’s are already mentioned, as well as a few others.
I think most shield users can add a few combo’s to that list.

- smoke bomb > push them back with shield #4 > blast finish shield #4 for stealth > EG#4 or Rocket boots for added blast finisher and jump back with prolonged stealth after you pushed them back.

- run into zerg > throw shield #5 for dazes all over > grenade barrage, freeze grenades… or any other big aoe hit they often dodge as you come in.

- stomp and shield #5 block. It’s a poor man’s elixir S.

- for zerg fighting a shield with piercing pistol shots from main hand pistol is fun to see. Numbers everywhere.
It’s handy in lagg actually.
It’s less effective in smaller fights though, things won’t die from pistol #1 of course.

The cooldown is an issue for me indeed.
Traited the cooldown is pretty good. It should be like that baseline.
I tend to trait it, and since I picked up Automatic medical response by traiting the shield, I take the healing turret for a nice reset at 25% to do the whole healing-blasting again.
people above have shown how nice the shield works with a healing turret.

1 ability : Blast Finisher.

The little bug on Static shield that lets you preform other actions, while still being able to block and throw.