(edited by Toolbox.9375)
Turret wishes. :(
I had previously spent a few minutes on turrets and while the concept and allure of being able to pick them up and them giving you new abilities (essentially they become like tool kits while in hand) does seem pretty nice I would rather they stick to their purpose which is to control a zone.
That said I feel that turrets should be made to drop fields similar to Throw Gunk / the field that Mortar Kit drops when Speedy Kits is traited whenever a turret is destroyed. This would allow better synergy with condition builds for the Engineer and still allow them to effectively zone/deter opponents.
This would also give Engineers more access to Ethereal Fields and all the other implied possibilities (Chaos Armor, Confusion) without being complete free since they now have to play to gain those advantages.
Net Turret should have it’s base range increased to 900, since all it literally does is immob (this skill is functionally worst than Net Shot on the Engineer’s Rifle since shorter distance and fixed firing position/wait 30s). On the same topic, this skill’s toolbelt skill is also sub-par since 3s immob on a 38s cool-down with 600 range. To compensate the skill should have it’s cool-down reduced or apply a Timed Charge onto the struck target for damage.
I don’t think turrets are necessary bad in stats. The main problem is that every-one gets between 3 and 10 stacks of stability when they punch their stun breakers (or otherwise, some also get theirs every 3 seconds repeating with a +0.7s time before you can remove each stack of stability which effectively means you aren’t stopping them without an immob, especially if they have +boon duration gear on) and therefore even if you trait into explosives turrets (which is a trait line that does not really benefit turrets at all) don’t perform well as Crowd Control/Area Control because they can’t punch through the stab wall of china OR eventually stack enough reasons for opponents to not want to be at 0 range face-rolling those turrets and the Engineer to oblivion.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not advocating that turrets alone should be able to fend off a player but instead they need more area control value / strength and in the light of these stab changes their crowd control benefits got weaker if your plan was to take a bunch of them on your skill bar. Some others just need the cool-downs/stats reconsidered (Net Turret).
Ground Targetted Turrets would be nice to see return but it isn’t the end of the world without that trait.
So in conclusion we find that a full bar of turrets is less appealing due to the stab changes, the trait-lines do not support effective turret use (since you have to take Explosives for the knock back, Inventions for actual useful Turret traits and Alchemy because you need condition clears or you will die a terrible horrible death). Turrets do not offer enough for effective damaging condition play (low frequency and scope of condition applications and little to no access to condition bomb pressure) to be taken with pistol/shield or pistol/pistol combos (effectively reducing or hammer/rifle play which impacts negatively on build diversity and the scope of their usefulness in various builds and you require the Firearms Trait Line for good condition pressure with pistol combos), many classes that were vulnerable to conditions have also received condition clearing buffs. They can not keep people away from you due to the stab changes, access to resistance (in some cases for incredible periods of time +10s with the right gear vs Warriors) and over-all poor access to more effective CCs without taking skills that do no damage and have abnormally long cool-downs. Turrets could be made stronger in their base stats since they are vulnerable to cleave, immobile and often just flat out less desirable but perhaps just adding some-thing like Throw Gunk when a turret is destroyed would help turrets to stay true to their design concept/purpose which is to control areas more effectively with dmg/CCs via conditions, support the Engineer or it’s party (Chaos Armor) and allow for a wider scope of condition applications (Confusion) via more access to Ethereal fields.
(edited by LilBiM.3581)
Let me sum up these rants: either combine turrets and gyros, or let gyro replace turrets. Neither can be realistically useful while the other exists. I know engi is supposed to be hodgepodge of all the other classes, but maybe rebrand scrapper ‘demolitionist’ combine pros and cons of turrets/gyros, and give a kitten nades/bombs trait synergizing with vulnerability, or even blindness. Blindness pushes that FT juggernaut agenda anet seems to want, but if you think hammer skills are boring… camping ft is exhausting. Only viable in new meta with p/p scrapper set up. <——still doesn’t apply enough ‘covering’ condi compared to other condi builds; say like a torment mes.
Oh, I wasn’t saying that the picked-up-turret moveset should be the focus; the abilities granted would have no immediate combat usage like a Kit, Conjure, or even Banner. Rather, the moveset is there only to aid in the improvement and positioning of the turret itself, including things like improving the fire rate on the Net Turret.
Zone control/area denial is exactly my desire. :P Right now, Turrets are just single-shot multi-purpose gadgets. You don’t place them down with any intention of keeping them around for more than their first attack. That’s not like turrets in other games, where you use them to effectively stake a claim on the area; GW2 Turrets are just another basic use-it-when-you-need-it-and-then-wait-out-the-cooldown ability. They’re reactive, not proactive. Even Mesmer Mantras have more in common with your typical turret than Engineer Turrets do.
Incorporating Chaos Fields could be neat, I certainly enjoy how many fields and finishers Engineer has access to. But I don’t think it’d do a lot towards controlling a zone. X) Furthermore, having the field appear when the Turret is destroyed just further encourages a place-and-break playstyle, rather than encouraging keeping the Turret alive for any length of time.
I have said it before and ill say it again. Turrets should become weaponry emplacements with a remote control, that is to say they would become semi-kits. When you have placed a turret the skill swaps over to “control x-turret” which gives you a remote control, essentially a kit with the twist that the skills do not originate from you but from wherever you placed the turret. It can still be destroyed but now we can pack some serious heat into these things. Your rocket turret is now a full on missile silo, that net turret sure does fire more things than just nets etc. Of course this would mean reworking healing turret as well, but lets be honest its functionality could more or less be implemented on elixir H instead (except for the blast) so that the toolbelt heals aoe, is a water field and cleanses conditions.
Furthermore one could then allow allies to walk up to them and use them (the owner takes priority similar to siege weapons in wvw). With stats affecting them this means a power engineer could for example let a necromancer use the condition intensive skill.
The current playstyle if it could be called that could be preserved by allowing them to fire their current basic attacks when not in use if you trait for it.
The end result would be the final vengance of the turret engis, allowing them turn the tables and laugh at the easy to play 4kit builds.
Also since our class is based on the idea of kits it makes sense to make turrets more kit like in function.
Somewhat like the old Mortar? That could be an awesome skill type for a new Elite Specialization, I’d love it. XD But it’s still not the upgradeable time-investment-reliant forward-base-create-y playstyle I so deeply long for!
Often when we think about X set of utilities require a change we do not spend a lot of time thinking about how it would work with other skills out there, such as main hand weapons, other utilities, elites, and trait lines. With that said let’s revisit my earlier concept of Throw Gunk on Turret Destruction, keeping in mind the multitude of conditions it could potentially inflict (at random).
If you took Hammer and decided you wanted to use turrets you could now choose to gain Chaos Armor from Rocket Charge if you are running Scrapper Condi/Power. Either way you gain access to more boons, and a few debilitating conditions vs your enemies. Traits such as Recovery Matrix and Expert Examination could be fore-gone in favor of a more aggressive play-style instead.
Pistol/Shield – main hand has a projectile finisher, off hand has a blast finisher and another projectile finisher. If you go full condi there is some benefits that can be had and you don’t even need to be a Scrapper. Having more access to Chaos Armor and Confusion could raise pistol/shield’s survivability enough (via potentially more weakness, blind and cripple access as well as more confusion access) to make it more viable again. Importantly Pistol/Shield users could now potentially have more access to a higher damaging condition (confusion stacks) that they currently do not. Scrappers can finally take advantage of Impact Savant since they would be more justified in perhaps running pistol/shield.
Pistol/Pistol – Projectile finisher and you already have a lot of access to conditions however the low frequency of higher damaging conditions may be resolved with some combo fielding shenanigans.
Rifle – Leap Finisher, Projectile Finisher. Opens up defensive options for the engineer that don’t involve double elixir S where you can’t fight back and potentially could keep you in the fight.
We have not touched traits or utilities yet but I feel like there could be potential across the board for more build diversity here… maybe even, potentially, a path to resurrecting several of the few main hand/off-hand weapons that have disappeared from the battle-fields.
P.S. I would like to see Slow be added to that list of conditions Throw Gunk could apply.
Basic things I wanna see unless they completely remake them:
- Turrets can crit
- Reflect bubble thing activates everytrime whenever you use the active ability in addition to its current effect.
- reduced cds, improved attack speed
- turrets are affected by boons
(edited by Ovalkvadratcylinder.9365)
Basic things I wanna see unless they completely remake them:
- Turrets can crit
- Reflect bubble thing activates everytrime whenever you use the active ability in addition to its current effect.
- reduced cds, improved attack speed
- turrets are affected by boons
Health increase would be nice. They should give them bonus health in PvElike necro minions.