Guild Wars 2

Now I’m not the most experienced engineer around, but I still wonder why ANet felt that our weapons should deal less damage ‘because we have kits’ and what role each kit (and the engineer in general for that matter) is supposed to fulfill in this game.

So what is beneficial about sacrificing a utility slot in order to equip a kit; compared to other classes that have their weapons (plus weapon swap) and a free utility slot to fill up as they see fit? Some claim it’s because of versatility, but to me an elementalist swapping attunements is way more versatile than an engineer (and they don’t even have to sacrifice a utility slot).

To me it seems that kits in general are relatively weak and the replacement skills they offer do not balance out the sacrifices in slotting them. Engineer was supposed to fill a role, but it seems ANet has trouble with finding the proper way to enable that concept.

As such I would suggest adding PASSIVE EFFECTS to kits that stay activate for as long as the kit is equipped. Each kit would then offer their own unique passive ability.

As such, I’d suggest adding the following effects:

• Med Kit: Regeneration for yourself and allies
• Elixir Gun: Remove Condition every 10 seconds
• Flamethrower: Move slower but gain Stability (the old Juggernaut)
• Bomb Kit: ?
• Grenade Kit: ?
• Tool Kit: ?

Sadly I’m not too familiar with Bomb/Grenade/Toolkit so I wouldn’t really know of a good passive to put on those kits… But the Flamethrower role seemed to have been aimed at being the stationary point/bottleneck defender; so why not give it that role as you originally intended? Same could go for the Med Kit where you sacrifice your offensive capabilities in order to provide (Medic!!) group support with AoE regeneration.

What do you guys think? Initially my suggestions as presented may seem OP, but I guess ANet could view them as an avenue to explore the possibilities or maybe change Kit Refinement so it gets these effects (functioning similar to Attunement traits of elementalists) instead of the current (imo broken) iCD+gCD.

No. Nooooooooo. Kits are already our best utilities, and each one has anywhere from 2 to 4 very strong skills attached. Our turrets, gadgets, and elixirs need buffing the most badly – the RNG nature of elixirs, the pure bad-ism of turret & gadgets.. they just need an overhaul. Every kit ability has a pretty strong toolbelt skill, with the worst being either elixir gun or flamethrower (which, when you think about it, isn’t really that bad). The only elixir with a good toolbelt is elixir R, every other one is literally RNG: S has a 50% chance of trolling you. U had a 33% chance of making you flip a table. B is 25% chance to be useful, 75% to be something that isn’t really a major difference. Etcetera.

@Kamahl – I’m sorry, but I don’t understand what your response has to do with my suggestion of adding certain passive effects when using a kit. To me you’re comparing toolbelt skills, which isn’t why I made this thread

Well if Anet add this they again nerf all our abilites by 25% to compensate it..

Aveneo.2068:

@Kamahl – I’m sorry, but I don’t understand what your response has to do with my suggestion of adding certain passive effects when using a kit. To me you’re comparing toolbelt skills, which isn’t why I made this thread

Lemme sum it up for you – kits are our best utility skills. Other types of engineer utility skills can’t compete. Kits do not need buffing in general. Other skill types do. Toolbelt skills play a major role in how good an engineer utility skill is.

Now do you understand?

Rozbuska.5263:

Well if Anet add this they again nerf all our abilites by 25% to compensate it..

Ah, so it’s pointless to suggest anything then as ANet will do a 25% nerf for every 10% buff?

Guess I’ll just play the game and make do with what we’ve got then. No sense wasting our time on these forums if ANet’s does not care anyway.

Kamahl.3621:

Aveneo.2068:

@Kamahl – I’m sorry, but I don’t understand what your response has to do with my suggestion of adding certain passive effects when using a kit. To me you’re comparing toolbelt skills, which isn’t why I made this thread

Lemme sum it up for you – kits are our best utility skills. Other types of engineer utility skills can’t compete. Kits do not need buffing in general. Other skill types do. Toolbelt skills play a major role in how good an engineer utility skill is.

Now do you understand?

Hmmm, your response strikes me as condescending and rude; but I hope that wasn’t intentional. I agree that the engineer needs to be improved across the board as it feels at the absolute bottom of the pile in terms of functionality (even below ranger, and I play one of those too).

Guess there’s nothing for us to do then except pray every night before we go to sleep; hoping the ANet balance team doesn’t muck it up … again and again and chooses a direction on how the engineer is supposed to function.

Some kits still need buffs, like flamethrower (which is terrible unless you dedicate every rune and sigil to buff it’s damage) and elixir gun (if they replaced this entire kit with a double SE slot skill I wouldn’t mind). Grenades and bombs are fine for now.

Therefore, the change you suggest isn’t needed to get people to use kits. Where I can see this suggestion working is as a grandmaster for the tools trait line. Replace armor mods and adrenal implant with Kit specialist and Gadget specialist.

Kit specialist gives you passives for your kits:
Grenades-Stacks of might (3 maybe?)
Bombs-Retaliation
Flamethrower- 6 sec stability every 10 sec.
Elixir gun-Cures condition every 10 sec is good
Toolkit- % to cause stun when hit
Medkit- Regen for allies is fine.

To get these passives the player has to be using the kit. This would actually give people a strategic reason to be in kits like toolkit and medkit when your #3,4,5 are on cooldown.

Also, being a grandmaster, this trait would need to compete with traits like grenadier and juggernaut. It would give us a reason for going 30 into tools, other than kit refinement and speedy kits.

I do believe that we are in need of some better traits for gadgets and a similar trait for them would be in order as well. Gadget engis should suggest some passives for a Gadget specialist trait.

JohnDied.3476:

To get these passives the player has to be using the kit. This would actually give people a strategic reason to be in kits like toolkit and medkit when your #3,4,5 are on cooldown.

exactly.

at the moment kits are only there to switch to, when other skills are on cooldown. so this (like current juggernaut) encourages people staying on one kitset, which increases build variety.

if staying at one kit becomes viable for some situations (like pve, when u need pure damage for example) suddently u have more space in your utility bar to put in gadgets or even turrets, whichthen suddently get used. unless you’re spamming elixiers in there, that is.

Yay! People understand the basis of my suggestion. It’s to make people WANT to stay in a particular kit for a period of time depending on the situation because of the passive benefits.

@Kamahl
You sound like a d!ck.

@OP
I’d love for at least one of our mechanics to have passive effects, whether its Turrets, Gadgets or Kits I really think having some passive support would help our profession.

And just a suggestion for Bomb Kit.
-Placing a bomb grants 1 sec of swiftness

That would be awesome.
Speed Shoes Bomberman!

This is how I figured it would have been. Like ele attunement switching almost . We don’t have any Passives or signets so what gives

Kits… acting like signets/attunements. Genius.

I don’t think people need another reason to either use kits or feel like they should be using kits, whether they like them or not, and having them be both weapons and passive effect generators would qualify.

Give a different set of skills passive effects, and I might agree with it there, but kits just don’t need it in comparison to our other skills.

Personally, I don’t see this suggestion as a reason for someone to use one kit. If done properly I see this suggestion as a reason for engineers to use more than one kit, but to focus on each kit better than they do now.

It seems counter intuitive, so let me explain.

Right now you go 30 into explosives to get grenadier, 30 into firearms to get juggernaut, and 30 into inventions to get healing bombs. Having this be a grandmaster trait for the tools line (and remember having another grandmaster for gadgets) will mean that we can only focus on one other thing, that being survival or beefing up one more kit. The benefit however is that we have reasons to go into any kit (assuming we boost none) and therefore loose nothing if we decide to switch kits between battles.

This would certainly boost our versatility since we get bonuses for every kit, encouraging us to choose any kit without changing our build.

Before anyone says that this is overpowered, because we’d see 4 kit engineers as the only viable option, remember that this would require you to invest 30 into tools (a line no one invests 30 into right now). Also, this trait would only benefit people who spend time in each kit, want regen? spend some time in the medkit instead of just spamming every button and then switching out. Want to cleanse conditions off allies? Use your elixir gun instead of just spamming SE when it’s off cooldown.

This trait would encourage 1 or 2 kit engineers to learn to utilize every ability a kit has to offer, instead of being kings of spam.

So with something like this trait, we get rid of two problems engineers have. First we get rid of the problem where engineers feel forced to use one or two weapons always because they chose a specific build. Second we get rid of engineers just spamming abilities across the board because hey, I have 29 with my 4 kits why not use all of them?

As for Gadget specialist, I’ve got some ideas. PvPeers can come and tell me I’m crazy but at least suggest some better ones while you’re at it.

Gadget specialist: Using gadgets triggers additional effects.
Battering ram- Skill applies 4 stacks of vulnerability, toolbelt causes 3 stacks of confusion
Rocket boots- Skill causes blind, toolbelt causes 3 stacks of vulnerability
Slick Shoes- Skill applies 4 stacks of vulnerability, toolbelt grants 3 seconds of quickness
Goggles- Skill grant’s 3 stacks of might, toolbelt causes weakness
Mine- Skill causes 3 stacks of confusion, toolbelt strips boons

EDIT: If these changes make turrets look like crap then good, they need to scale with our toughness and power before they’ll be any good.

^ Yes I’ve always thought there should be a Kit Refinement Flavored skill for Gadgets and even Turrets.

I think it would be a very easy way to improve on areas where Gadgets and Turrets are lacking without having to completetly change them around. It just makes it so that if you invest in Gadgets or Turrets you will get more out of them the same way Kit Refinement does for Kits.

Your suggestions look good, I personally would rather have only the Utility skills affected and no the TB ones so that maybe the effects would be better rather than 2 watered down ones.
Maybe using PBR grants Stability – that seems to fit.
Slick Shoes- could be immune to soft CC like cripple/frost etc.
Rocket Boots- how bout not falling on your face.
Goggles- mark target for yourself only, mark can see through stealth and is not removed from cloning. I wish
Mine- Thowing mine will also produce 2 dummy mines.

note- I dont mean these as passive effects but on activate ones.