Guild Wars 2

I originally wrote this post as a reply to something in the “is engineer that bad? common” thread.

I decided to create a new topic because I actually wanted the following to be discussed in detail. Sorry if this seems like a rant, but it’s something that’s been bothering me for some time.

Anyone is more than welcome to tell me that they disagree with my opinions, this topic is to elicit though and discussion on something I consider an issue for the engineer class. That being said, please be kind, we’re all friends here

amiable.4823:

Take for example Mesmers, elementalists and thieves, who can both stack utilities that are helpful both offensively and defensively, while putting out far superior damage over time. Even if we have a build that does not focus on kits many of our utilities are flat out worse than comparable utilities in other classes and either possess a significant drawback such as a self root or have a random effect that means most of the time you re rolling the dice and hoping for the effect you want.

After having made elementalist and mesmer alts, after the whole OMG this is so OP wore off, I kept note of something that I’ve noticed when making alts for any other profession in the game. What I noticed was that those classes (Ranger, Guardian, Elementalist, Mesmer) aren’t completely dependent on slot skills to be effective. Those professions are solid without their slot skills and better with them. The engineer isn’t solid without slot skills, in fact, it is kitten useless without them.

This reflects something the devs need to address with regards to the engineer, they need to address the issue that our main-hand weapons are inefficient and ineffective. Some may not agree with me, but I think this is symptomized by two kinds of builds the engineer has, the kit engineer and the might stacking engineer.

The kit engineer tries to make up for our inefficient main-hand weapons by loading himself with kits, which are themselves mostly inefficient by design (bar a few). He equips himself with a lot of kits to be able to acquire (what he considers) a necessary amount of useful skills. Why? because our our main-hand weapons lack enough useful skills for a good build and no one kit contains all the skills which we will need. That is why you see 4 kit engineers running around without stun breakers because they want to have at least two damage kits (like grenade or bombs) and the elixir gun (for one skill, SE). Grenades and bombs are a whopping 10 skills, on top of our 5 main weapon skills. Why do we need 10+ damage skills? Why have the devs made the engineer’s damage so low that some consider 10+ skills necessary to kill things? Why have they made our utilities so minor and spread out across so many kits to the point where some need 4?

A well built ranger only needs 14 skills. A 4 kit engineer gets 29 skills. I don’t see why we need 29 skills at once. Our kits and weapons need a much needed clean up or redesign.

On the other side of the engineer spectrum we have the might stacking (as well as the static discharge) engineers. These builds embrace our main-hand weapons, they focus on using every skill they provide and are perceptive of the nuances and quirks of each weapon or kit they use. The might stacking or static discharge engineer likes our main-hand weapon skills, but they thing they just need a little kick to them because they’re ineffective on their own. So the SD or Might engineer uses our all to valuable slot skills to buff our damage, in any way possible. If the person is capable enough to go without stun breakers or defenses, they can go full GC and dedicate every slot skill to be able to achieve the effectiveness they want out of our main weapons.

A warrior/thief/mesmer/elementalist doesn’t need to use 4+ skills to buff themselves to be able to do great damage as a glass cannon. Why then do static discharge/might stacking engineers do that? What I can discern from this is that our weapon damage needs a well deserved increase

The devs have said that the engineer sacrifices damage on our main-hand weapons in order to be a versatile profession. The problem with this is that we are not versatile if we are both ineffective and inefficient. I’m talking about our main-hand weapons because fixing them would be a good start, but If you look at kits you would see that they have the same problems. Just take a look at the might stacking flamethrower.

I´m pretty sure that the devs said something about versatility comes at cost of damage on our mainhand weapon.
And yeh, that´s the issue you try to address if I´m not completely mistaken.

While other classes get their slotskills to support and compliment their builds, they´re the engineer´s bread and butter.
I don´t mind that, but as you said: We don´t have a stunbreak if we run 4 kits. Which I find to be a little bit fatal at times.

And yes, maybe a little increase of damage on our mainweapon would probably be a good thing.

O, and you forgot the might-stacking 4 kit engineer ;D

I agree with the sentiment that our weapons need work, in light of the fact that I just don’t use kits.

I don’t, however, think ‘upvoting’ is a thing on this forum. It’s rather like a big, less funny game of Who’s Line Is It Anyway?, as far as I can tell.

I agree that we can’t use our uitlity as we want because we can’t only rely on our weapon skills, like an Elem can. Like you said, an Elem can have 3 defensive utilities, while keeping 20 weapon skills.

I disagree that our kit are lack luster. I think, right now, Engineer got a lot better in this game meta.

We are not at Elem DD, mesmer, guardian level, but we are still efficient.

We need a bit of a push up, but overall I’m happy to be where we are at.

Once they balance the over the board class, it’s should be good.

Sure we have to work harder to get things down, but that’s why you play an engineer. To have more options. Anet can’t balance a class because it’s harder, or every elite player would go for the harder class to have better result.

I appreciate the quote. The other half of the equation is the “tax” we pay for the toolbelt skills. Most of the toolbelt skills are weak to the point of almost uselessness (with a few notable exceptions), but we pay a “tax” for the extra skill by making the main utility somewhat less useful and/or substantially increasing its cooldown. Now there are some exceptions (Elixir S and its toolbelt are both pretty good, but again the randomness of the toolbelt is VERY frustrating).

amiable.4823:

I appreciate the quote. The other half of the equation is the “tax” we pay for the toolbelt skills. Most of the toolbelt skills are weak to the point of almost uselessness (with a few notable exceptions), but we pay a “tax” for the extra skill by making the main utility somewhat less useful and/or substantially increasing its cooldown. Now there are some exceptions (Elixir S and its toolbelt are both pretty good, but again the randomness of the toolbelt is VERY frustrating).

Yeah, I hoped you didn’t think I took anything out of context. The original reply was in agreement with your post, so I kept the quote in there for that reason.

Anymras.5729:

I agree with the sentiment that our weapons need work, in light of the fact that I just don’t use kits.

I don’t, however, think ‘upvoting’ is a thing on this forum. It’s rather like a big, less funny game of Who’s Line Is It Anyway?, as far as I can tell.

I took out the edit. I wasn’t sure about it since I normally don’t like them either. Your comment solidified this sentiment. Thank you.

Cero.5132:

I´m pretty sure that the devs said something about versatility comes at cost of damage on our mainhand weapon.
And yeh, that´s the issue you try to address if I´m not completely mistaken.

The problem with this is that we are not versatile if we are both ineffective and inefficient. I’m talking about our main-hand weapons because fixing them would be a start. If you look at kits you would see that they have the same problems, just look at might stacking flamethrower.

Cero.5132:

O, and you forgot the might-stacking 4 kit engineer ;D

I did forget him. I always try to…

No matter what loadout we get, in addition to our low damage, only 4 out of 5 of our weapon skills will deal damage. INCLUDING kits. (Except Grenade kit. Grenade kit 3 deals 33 damage, which is hilariously lower damage than an autoattack.)

Coupled with lower damage coefficients… yeah… I think I see a problem.

I look at this the other way around tbh.

Our slot skills are our MAIN weapons. And the weapon slot is for augmentation support.

I´m pretty sure that the devs said something about versatility comes at cost of damage on our mainhand weapon.

at this point they didnt know pve and WvW is 95% damage oriented.

This vision anet has of versatility via kits does not exists. Kit’s are sub par by default. You need traits to bring them up to par or better. When you spend your traits to bring up 1 kit, you leave out the other kits as sub par.

What the kits need to validate the claim of “versatility” are traits that affect all kits. Traits like backpack regenerator, kit refinement, and speedy kits.

We need stuff to happen when equipping or stowing a kit (like when traited, a necro can cast spells, gain buffs when entering DS, or heal when they leave DS) for the said kit to be worth the utility slot. Hell, FT and EG are better condition cleansers with kit refinement than cleaning formula 409.

Personally I think kits need to to either specialize in either direct damage or condition damage. They want us to use these so called “Kits” as our weapons and our weapons as an accessory. Personally I like using the Wrench Kit, why not make the auto attack apply bleeds or every third attack apply a burning effect.