Guild Wars 2

I’m creating this thread for people that are just purchasing this game as a warning so that they do not consider rolling an engineer. As a caveat, I only play wvw so I’m not able to intelligently comment on how the class performs in pve and spvp.

For some background, I have been playing mmos since 1999, and have played virtually every single major title released during this period. I’ve been playing an engineer as my main since the 2nd beta world event. I’ve logged over 600 hours on it. I’ve tried virtually every single build there is, experimented extensively with all of our kits, gone pistol/pistol, pistol/shield, and rifle, have multiple sets of exotic gear, tried maximizing turrets, and have used both elixirs and gadgets. I’ve tested everything, and I try to squeeze every ounce out of my spec through theorycraft. I admit that I do have success playing the profession despite the profession’s inherent disadvantages.

That all said, the engineer plain and simply does not stack up against most other professions that are equally played and geared. It just doesn’t. I don’t want that to be true, but it is. In most cases you simply have to play flawlessly to beat other classes.

In addition, the class is riddled with bugs, which the developers have completely ignored, instead rolling out wave after wave of n-erfs in every patch. The recent adjustments that have been made to the profession do not in any way bring us up to par with warriors, thieves, elementalists, and mesmers. If anything they put us further behind.

Also, the engineer does not bring the same level of support and versatility to a group that other classes are able. The truth of the matter is that we are a second rate profession that will remain so for the foreseeable future.

Do not be fooled by the people who will chime in on this thread saying that the engineer class is fine, and l2p. I know how to play. I also know that when I get on a thief or warrior it is complete easy mode in comparison.

The only reason to play the engineer class is if you like playing the underdog, and can deal with the reality that if you aren’t absolutely perfect in many encounters you will lose.

Take this as a warning from someone who continues to stick it out on an engineer despite it being sub-par.

Roll a warrior, thief, mesmer, or elementalist if you are considering the engineer class.

Just trust me and you will be glad you did.

+1 to most of the things written here. “You simply have to play flawlessly”, and, “will die a lot against other classes [in pvp]”! Plus a lot of bugs that you will discover. Even if they were all fixed, ud still die tho. But, OP, If you are not playing pve with the engineer, sir, you are missing out on a lot of fun. I disagree with the statement “Engineer does not bring the same level of support found in other classes”. SE does nothing? bomb heals do nothing? controlling the enemy does nothing for ur team? we got kittens upon kittens of knockbacks. Despite all the hang ups I really enjoy this class and won’t soon change my style.

Go read any profession forum and everyone are whining about something. All classes are just fine least for leveling up 80.

Of course if you expect to become pvp or pve “god” at the 80 then by all means look elsewhere but there is lots of fun things with the engi on the way…

Warning: Do not listen to this guy and roll a Engineer if you find the class awesome! We can do just fine in WvsW which I do for a majority of my time ingame, and I love it

Hey, let’s all do a thing in order to gather our own opinions about doing that thing.

That’d be neat.

While I don’t personally pvp. (hated it for years) there are some serious problems with this class, OP is right in that regard. I would personally tell all new players to hold off making one until they address most of the bugs we’ve had to deal with since before launch on this class.

+1 Op is right.

I have 1300 hours played in GW 2. I have leveled 6x 80 characters and almost having 2 legendary weapons and I have to agree on Engineers beeing the worst class in Guild Wars 2.

Not only that they are underdogs, underpowered but also their normal weapon skills are totally lame, not fun and they need to be changed. You are forced to go weapon kits instead of normal weapons because of that.

Rifle in pve? … Those are really viable and fun abilites? Dont make me laught
Pistols? Did you see that animation and the damage? Dont make me laught again

Engineers may be useful in some way but they are NO WAY near to be equal to other classes in Guild Wars 2.

You want Legendary on your Engineer? Waste of time and resources.

Areanet please …

Id strongly urge new players to avoid this profession.

It is argueably the most bugged profession. Underperforms relative to other professions in just about every aspect. And has to deal with unintuitive mechanics. Any role you wish to fullfill can be done better by most other professions.

And the devs have gone on record that this is intented.

I haven’t played WvWvW meta-game for a while. Is everyone still running glass-cannon builds? If so, run p/p condition/elixirs.
I run Carrion gear, have won the vast majority of my 1v1 fights, beat thieves almost 100% of the time. Only thing that counters a good Condition build is a good vitality/cleansing build. Anything relying on toughness or just flat out berserker gear will get crushed.

I do feel like the Engineer is quite weak, but it’s not like it can’t hold it’s own ground. Been playing Engineer since BWE1 and I’ve found my condition build to be the most effective thing for open world PvE and WvWvW. May not be the most optimal, or have the most versatility and burst, but my Engineer has the survivability and the DOT to kill pretty much anything but the tankiest of builds.

Ashes.6418:

I haven’t played WvWvW meta-game for a while. Is everyone still running glass-cannon builds? If so, run p/p condition/elixirs.
I run Carrion gear, have won the vast majority of my 1v1 fights, beat thieves almost 100% of the time. Only thing that counters a good Condition build is a good vitality/cleansing build. Anything relying on toughness or just flat out berserker gear will get crushed.

I do feel like the Engineer is quite weak, but it’s not like it can’t hold it’s own ground. Been playing Engineer since BWE1 and I’ve found my condition build to be the most effective thing for open world PvE and WvWvW. May not be the most optimal, or have the most versatility and burst, but my Engineer has the survivability and the DOT to kill pretty much anything but the tankiest of builds.

Have you tryed condition/toughtness/precision necormance or mesmer? Go try their damage and surviveability in wvw or pve and I am telling you that youll see how they are 2x more powerful than engineer in same gear.

We are just saying that engineers controlled by skilled players will always perform the bad VS other classes also controlled by skilled players.

No one here is saying Engineers cant perform good but they cant perform good as any other classes in this game. Not even close. Sadly

Engi is fine and can hold its ground against any other profession out there, but if you are like OP or most of the whiners here who cant handle profession that requires more than 3 key presses to compete its better to roll something like warrior or thief.

OP is technically correct. The ones that disagree have similar builds, talking from a wide variety of builds they don;t work unless specific things are tended forcing you in a certain build you may not like. Overall Engis isn;t good unless you want to run similar builds.

Based on all the class changes since beta 1, it’s safe to say don’t play engineer if you want to PVP WVW or PVE not solo. Despite any optimism you may hear from rose tinted player viewpoints, the devs stated philosophy for this class is it’s bad at melee and range and that having opportunity costs underpowered and inflexible kits is also a reason for inferior weapons.

You can only play this class if you avoid all alts or comparison to other classes, it’s bad by design, it’s massively bugged, major features like turrets and kits are negated due to tbad balanceand their opportunity costs, it’s far less versatile than other classes and can do fewer things at once.

Engineer could have good potential, it’s one of the more interesting class concepts seen in the last fifteen years of MMOs but I think only new blood on the design team could finish the concepts and make it a proper GW2 ready class.

Cato.3547:

Engi is fine and can hold its ground against any other profession out there, but if you are like OP or most of the whiners here who cant handle profession that requires more than 3 key presses to compete its better to roll something like warrior or thief.

And this is what most “whiners” as you call them are saying. The Eng player has to perform better than most of other professions to hold its ground. If you as a eng make a mistake it lights out with thief if make a mistake just drop shadow refuge and leave area to reset the fight. This applies to many other classes. D/D Ele just mistform and go etc. Eng loses out on a lot of “Oh crap” buttons because we have to lose 1 utility slot to equip a kit to have same number of skills another class has.

MrSilver.5269:

…. In most cases you simply have to play flawlessly to beat other classes.
….

Do not be fooled by the people who will chime in on this thread saying that the engineer class is fine, and l2p.
….
I also know that when I get on a thief or warrior it is complete easy mode in comparison.

If you are playing a skilled opponent 1v1 then you should have to play flawlessly to beat them. I don’t generally have a problem with any class, and can 1v3 or 4 on many occasions when I’m bunkering to keep a few distracted. The one exception is Thieves who hack, just not enough defense in the game to stay alive open field against a teleport hacker. If you know enough to realize most players just “burst, burst, burst” and then have nothing left, there are easy ways to counter this and win. The skilled players are the fun battles, and can last a few minutes while you figure out and try to counter each other. This is where the engi shines because of the number of options you can have available at any given time.

The engineer class isn’t fine, as with most classes it has bugs that need to be fixed. Relative to the other classes though, it is fine in most respects. Generally I won’t bother with Thieves or Mesmers open field in WvW because I usually have an objective to complete. If I’m just roaming though, watch out because I will chase you down after you’ve spent your predictable bag of tricks.

I don’t want a class where its simply “3,4,5,1,1,1,1,3,4,5,1,1,1,1,3,4,5,1,1,1,1”. I like switching kits in battle, using tool belt skills, and needing all 12 buttons. It’s more fun.

Dogblaster.6713:

You want Legendary? Waste of time and resources.

fixed that for you.

Tyaen.5148:

Dogblaster.6713:

You want Legendary? Waste of time and resources.

fixed that for you.

Hah funny If you want to play game like this. Here is one for you and all of us.

You want to play computer games? Waste of time and resources

P.S.: Legendary weapons are not waste of time, they are awesome skins but some people thing they are too expensive, grindy etc., thats their problem.

For me its not waste of time, unless you want it for you engineer at this moment

TTK on an Engineer is far longer than it should be. It’s not satisfying to play. I can be pecking away at a mob for twenty seconds, and only have a third of the health bar gone. Then a Guardian or a Warrior shows up, and that’s it, it’s gone in three hits. I can do some heals and condition removal, but it’s paltry compared to what the Guardian is giving out. I don’t see bars move when I’m hitting or healing. I don’t feel powerful, and I don’t feel durable, and I don’t feel helpful.

As someone whose only 80 is the main Engineer he’s played since beta, I’m afraid I have to put him on a shelf and level something relevant. Avoid this class in its current, December 2012, incarnation.

I play a bunker engineer and so far have had many people complimenting me for the support my healing bombs build offers both in dungeons and in WoE. Are you one of those people who just looks at damage numbers first and foremost?

Tyaen.5148:

MrSilver.5269:

…. In most cases you simply have to play flawlessly to beat other classes.
….

Do not be fooled by the people who will chime in on this thread saying that the engineer class is fine, and l2p.
….
I also know that when I get on a thief or warrior it is complete easy mode in comparison.

If you are playing a skilled opponent 1v1 then you should have to play flawlessly to beat them. I don’t generally have a problem with any class, and can 1v3 or 4 on many occasions when I’m bunkering to keep a few distracted. The one exception is Thieves who hack, just not enough defense in the game to stay alive open field against a teleport hacker. If you know enough to realize most players just “burst, burst, burst” and then have nothing left, there are easy ways to counter this and win. The skilled players are the fun battles, and can last a few minutes while you figure out and try to counter each other. This is where the engi shines because of the number of options you can have available at any given time.

The engineer class isn’t fine, as with most classes it has bugs that need to be fixed. Relative to the other classes though, it is fine in most respects. Generally I won’t bother with Thieves or Mesmers open field in WvW because I usually have an objective to complete. If I’m just roaming though, watch out because I will chase you down after you’ve spent your predictable bag of tricks.

I don’t want a class where its simply “3,4,5,1,1,1,1,3,4,5,1,1,1,1,3,4,5,1,1,1,1”. I like switching kits in battle, using tool belt skills, and needing all 12 buttons. It’s more fun.

Well I dont know if you tryed other classes than Engineer but those who did can clearly see that Engineers and underpowered class. Simple as that.

PhoenixTril.4258:

TTK on an Engineer is far longer than it should be. It’s not satisfying to play. I can be pecking away at a mob for twenty seconds, and only have a third of the health bar gone. Then a Guardian or a Warrior shows up, and that’s it, it’s gone in three hits. I can do some heals and condition removal, but it’s paltry compared to what the Guardian is giving out. I don’t see bars move when I’m hitting or healing. I don’t feel powerful, and I don’t feel durable, and I don’t feel helpful.

As someone whose only 80 is the main Engineer he’s played since beta, I’m afraid I have to put him on a shelf and level something relevant. Avoid this class in its current, December 2012, incarnation.

THIS IS EXACTLY what we are talking about.

Engineers can be good support, then support guardian come and engi can simply log out.
Egineers can be good damage, then any other class come and engi can simply log out.
etc…
Everything engineers do can simply any other class do 10x better. From supporting to damaging.

Lifelike.5862:

I play a bunker engineer and so far have had many people complimenting me for the support my healing bombs build offers both in dungeons and in WoE. Are you one of those people who just looks at damage numbers first and foremost?

Well, Shouts on Warrior heal about the same amount over time and you are not completly useless standing in there with tanky hammer build which still deals more dmg then glascanone engi will ever deal.

@Cato

Do you tPvP? Or even sPvP?

There is a reason why you don’t see more then 5% of engineer. You have to fight flawless to be effective, and you are pigeon holed in a bunker build.

On one of my build, I have MORE skills then an elementalist, which Anet said they were the hardest class to play.

I have to juggle between 4-5 kits + toolbelt without a mistake, to expect to maybe win if I’m not fighting one of my counter. If I ever encounter a good Mesmer or P/D thief? just run away.

In WvW it’s a lot better, people are less skilled and more build are useful. Hell I’m running a nearly glass cannon build with static bolt and I’m having a lot of succes. WvW with engineer is fun!

I disagree with OP in a sense, if you want to play Engineer, go for it! The class is really fun to play, has a lot of option, and is great in WvW.

But if you want an easy and effective class in PvP, go somewhere else. tPvP will be hell for you and you will be stuck in a bunker build that’s less efficient then Guardian ect.

Engineer has a high skill level cap, some build even higher then Elem. I don’t see how Anet didn’t see that yet. If we make a mistake, we don’t have much “Oh kitten” skill like Ride the lightning, their blink and mist form. We are done if we miss our rotation. And with the lag I had in sPvP lately (didnt have it in WvW) it sure doesn’t help.

Tl;DR : Good Class! Fun Class! But you will have to outplay your oponnent to win.

Forestnator.6298:

Lifelike.5862:

I play a bunker engineer and so far have had many people complimenting me for the support my healing bombs build offers both in dungeons and in WoE. Are you one of those people who just looks at damage numbers first and foremost?

Well, Shouts on Warrior heal about the same amount over time and you are not completly useless standing in there with tanky hammer build which still deals more dmg then glascanone engi will ever deal.

The shout hammer warrior cannot, however, confuse multiple targets easily (outside of one trait that relies on an opponent being interrupted), create a smoke field for an AoE blind, have access to multiple blast finishers and combo fields (sans using a shortbow, which is arguably a bad idea anyway for a shout warrior), stack AoE retailliation, inflict poison to keep enemy healing down, and just about anything else he can do, I can do too with just as much efficiency if not better. AoE might? easily achieved with a simple 3-blast combo that can be worked into a DPS routine and heals my party members for just as much as For Great Justice. Reflect projectiles with a shield? I don’t need to put into a trait to get that effect. AOE cripple? Elixer gun. AoE Launch? He needs to take Stomp, a utility with a really long cooldown to do that, I only have to drop B.O.B and Glue Bomb at the same time, AND I can make it a blast finisher for any of my combo fields (light, water, fire, smoke). I could go on. I play a tank hammer warrior and he excells at controlling single targetsn with stun lock combos. My engineer does a better job of supporting the party, doesn’t have to blow any cooldowns to heal continuously either, which is a lifesaver. The only class that makes me feel ousted from my role is a guardian, and even then I can do some things that guardians can’t do. I have better escapes too.

Engineer is not for the lazy player. Yes, you do have to press more buttons, but it’s hardly difficult if you devote a bit of time into learning your patterns and combos. Warrior hits one button and gives might to the group and heals a bit. I hit 4 buttons, give more might, plus aoe crowd control, burning, healing, regen, retalliation, confusion, damage migitation and damage in one shot, and then I don’t have to wait for my shout to come back off cooldown, I can whip out the elixer gun and continue to support. An engineer played well never sits around twiddling their thumbs or mashing on 1 while waiting for cooldowns to come off. There’s always something you can be doing to maximise your productivity. As a warrior, I tend to fall into much simpler patterns and while it’s certainly a lot ~easier~, I never feel like I have the amount of control that my engineer has over a situation. The hammer warrior feels kitten until I pick out a target and land a stun on them, then it gets satisfying when I pull off a proper stun combo…and then all my skills are on cooldown for the next 10 seconds or so and I have to wait even longer for the full rotation to be available again. Better hit For Great Justice and hope they don’t notice me being a deadweight until I can pin someone down again.

To add to my previous post: I play WvW exclusively, so I can’t really speak to sPvP ot tPvP.

It works fine in the few dungeons I still go in to (Fractals), but I don’t really PvP since finishing world completion.

My own 2 cents

Yep were hard to play but were fun! example my mate plays a dagger dagger ele and says how it’s apparently the highest curve in game.. result I tried 1 and lol after a engi, useing kits, toolbelt and skills it seemed like easy mode :P

MY 80 necro, guardian and mesmer are all boringly simple compared to my 80 engi (so much so I rolled a second engi, as I wanted an asura one aswell)

BUt meh i’m a typical underdog player, if i’m told a class is gimp or unplayable, thats the class you will likely find me on.

If you like a challenge play an engi, every respec or patch is like having a whole new cl kitten to play with

MrSilver.5269:

I admit that I do have success playing the profession despite the profession’s disadvantages.

MrSilver.5269:

Take this as a warning from someone who continues to stick it out on an engineer despite it being sub-par.

Just quoting myself because I wanted to reemphasize the previous two points in response to a couple of the comments that have ensued since my original post.

As an experienced engineer I’m not rerolling and I’m toughing it out despite the disadvantages that the profession clearly is forced to endure.

At release I was this " – " close to rolling a warrior, and if I knew then what I know now I would NOT have rolled the engineer.

Why am I not rerolling? Because I get attached to my characters. My engineer has 100% world completion… don’t want to do that again. I’m fully geared (minus ascended) with multiple sets. I can’t stand leveling and don’t ever want to level another character again in this game. I don’t like playing unfinished characters. Bottom line… I made my bed. I know there are many people that don’t mind leveling new characters. I’m just not one of them.

That said… if I could give Arenanet $100.00 to swap my engineer for another profession the money would already be spent.

So to the person who is just buying this game, and is considering the engineer because on paper the profession looks appealing don’t make the same mistake that I made, unless you enjoy being the underdog playing an underrepresented class. If you don’t mind being underpowered, go for it.

If you want to be on equal footing with the other top tier professions that simply offer more steer clear of the engineer.

I know when I come to a game that is already in progress I like to hear what veteran players think of classes, and I thought I would give them the benefit of thoughts from an individual with nearly 700 hours played on an engineer.

Roll warrior, thief, elementalist, or mesmer.

Seriously.

If you don’t like the engineer then by all means play something else, warning others not to play a class that you personally don’t like is not a great thing to do.
I have played engineer since launch in both sPvP and PvE and i love the profession. It’s not a pure support or damage spec that works. You just have to figure out what you enjoy and do it.

It’s not like you have to play other professions from scratch now is it!

Terrahero.9358:

Id strongly urge new players to avoid this profession.

It is argueably the most bugged profession. Underperforms relative to other professions in just about every aspect. And has to deal with unintuitive mechanics. Any role you wish to fullfill can be done better by most other professions.

And the devs have gone on record that this is intented.

I’d strongly urge new players to experience the game themselves rather than just listening to what someone else said.

Necromancer forum claims to be the most bugged profession and underperforms relative to other professions in just about every aspect too. Also there’s a thief thread about how they’re the lowest performer overall now, and several about how they have almost no usable builds. The warrior forum is hosting a thread trying to explain why warriors aren’t seen as viable, and several suggestion threads on how to improve their skills.

Every class complains about any nerf as if it’s the end of the world, and every class thinks they’re the worst off. Next major patch, rangers will get -3% damage on a skill nobody uses anyway, and the forum will fill up with threads about how people are quitting the game and how there’s no reason to ever play ranger, and a thread called “Do not roll a ranger” will pop up where someone will say what you just said.

Ultimately it’s all subjective. Amusingly enough I have an 80 necromancer, thief, and warrior. And a 70 engineer. And I like all of them.

Crows.2764:

Go read any profession forum and everyone are whining about something. All classes are just fine least for leveling up 80.

Of course if you expect to become pvp or pve “god” at the 80 then by all means look elsewhere but there is lots of fun things with the engi on the way…

The difference is that they still have builds that are considered “good” or despite their bugs can still hold their own in PvP instances. When I go on forums like the thief, ranger, warrior, etc, I see 75% of the post are builds and other things, only 15% are really complaints. Forums like Necro and Engineer however are full of complaints.

See we dont have a build that can hold its own well. Thiefs have the 24/7 stealth and instant 15,000 damage builds, warriors have thousands blades, mesmers (this is the one I see most often) is the clone spam/blurred frenzy build. If engineer still had a build that held its own in pvp then I’m sure much less of us would be complaint. Instead our only build, grenades, which people considered “op” (Which really wasn’t, it was mediocre at best) got nerfed hard every single class patch while their op builds go untouched.

Deified.7520:

See we dont have a build that can hold its own well. Thiefs have the 24/7 stealth and instant 15,000 damage builds, warriors have thousands blades, mesmers (this is the one I see most often) is the clone spam/blurred frenzy build. If engineer still had a build that held its own in pvp then I’m sure much less of us would be complaint. Instead our only build, grenades, which people considered “op” (Which really wasn’t, it was mediocre at best) got nerfed hard every single class patch while their op builds go untouched.

I would recommend experimenting with you engineer and learning the class in pvp before complaining.

Thief 15000 dmg, clones on mesmer & thousand blades – All easily countered by elixir s

I’ve had tons of thieves jump me with the heartstrike just to waste all of their initiative on elixir s and then I just cc destroy them.

That’s just one example of how to counter them. I’ll let you figure out the rest!

While I don’t think the doom and gloom are quite as severe as some posters are making them out to be, I do think the OP has a point. The engineer is not as strong in any area as any other class. In most games, this jack-of-all-trades, master of none setup can work, because the other classes are all specialists. Being versatile is a useful thing. In GW2, all classes are jack-of-all-trades, or at least jack-of-several-trades, in addition to being the world champion at something. The engineer is not the world champion at anything, except possibly CC’ing itself.

It’s a fun class, and the mechanics are quirky and novel. I really enjoy playing it. But I’m not under any illusions that I am all that useful to a group. I am fortunate to be a member of a great guild that doesn’t mind gimping its groups by including good players who had the misfortune to roll a class that isn’t especially wonderful at anything.

If a new player trying out the engineer finds themselves frustrated most of the time, be aware that it likely isn’t the game. It’s a combination of engineer being a high skill cap class and also suffering from a disproportionate amount of bugs and other setbacks. We have the bones to be an awesome class, but it’s going to be a long and rough road getting there.

Nautix.6385:

Deified.7520:

See we dont have a build that can hold its own well. Thiefs have the 24/7 stealth and instant 15,000 damage builds, warriors have thousands blades, mesmers (this is the one I see most often) is the clone spam/blurred frenzy build. If engineer still had a build that held its own in pvp then I’m sure much less of us would be complaint. Instead our only build, grenades, which people considered “op” (Which really wasn’t, it was mediocre at best) got nerfed hard every single class patch while their op builds go untouched.

I would recommend experimenting with you engineer and learning the class in pvp before complaining.

Thief 15000 dmg, clones on mesmer & thousand blades – All easily countered by elixir s

I’ve had tons of thieves jump me with the heartstrike just to waste all of their initiative on elixir s and then I just cc destroy them.

That’s just one example of how to counter them. I’ll let you figure out the rest!

Yes, but if this thief had the same player skill u have, u would have had no chance. Elixier S identifys an engineer? Every class has escape skills… get serious.

I have a level 80 Engineer and four low-level alts. My alts are low-level because I just can’t stay away from the Engie to play them.

You see, I know that Engineer isn’t good at anything, and we can be outdone by at least one class in every role. However, I love the Engineer’s playstyle, and so I play it. Fun is, after all, the purpose of games, isn’t it?

@Dispari.3980

You are right.

You can’t judge a class over the forum.

But I would like to precise that necro whining on the forum are about the BUGS, and not the power of the class.

Necro are now a really strong class in tPvP. Their staff/well spaming build is one of the most reliable source of dps/conditions in the game.

But they have the worse bug in the games. I played all 3 “bugged” class (Necro, Engineer, Ranger). All of them have an amount of bug that shouldn’t be there 4 month after release.

But Necro is the worse, they have a whole class mecanism bugged (minions), Many minor bugs that I still wonder how they are still there.

Ranger got a lot better since last patch. Now that the pet are more reliable, their tank build is awesome. A lot of regen and defence + infinite vigor + Pets awesome dps + going with 2 wolf like pet for CC.

Engineer are bugged too, but are also underperforming. Sure you can do well with an engineer, but imagine what you could do with a mesmer with the same skill.

I think people should still play engineer, as the classe is a lot of fun and different from the usual warrior/mage/rogue style.

And about our nerf, it’s bad enought that they nerfed our best dps (Grenade) to balance our sigil. Nerf happen in mmo, we all know it. But when they nerf us, and buff Shatter mesmer, now It’s getting ugly.

Forestnator.6298:

Yes, but if this thief had the same player skill u have, u would have had no chance. Elixier S identifys an engineer? Every class has escape skills… get serious.

If he was better, I would have no chance either.

There are different things that work in different situations. The key is to pick and chose the play style that helps you against the professions you are having trouble with.
I am not saying that the engineer is on par with professions 100%. I just think that warning other people to stay away from this awesomely fun profession is a bad move.

It’s fun, at least for me. Easy to tell since 97% of my sPvP games are on engineer and the last three guardian/mesmer/thief. The reason I picked those professions is so I can learn to counter them because I had problems with them at first.

Nautix.6385:

If you don’t like the engineer then by all means play something else, warning others not to play a class that you personally don’t like is not a great thing to do.

That’s just it. I love the class, I love it dearly. It’s my favourite, and it always will be. But I can’t play it without constantly feeling disappointed.

Engineer is so promising as you’re leveling. The abilities initially feel very powerful, and very empowering, especially the kits. And then you hit 80, and you start doing dungeons and content with real, geared people, and suddenly the honeymoon’s over. That’s certainly how it felt for me, anyway.

Just to let people know what it feels like to have an L80 engineer: I do not get groups for fractals except from charitable guildmates. And most of the people are not kitten about it, “This is a PUG and fractals past 8 can be dicey with PUGs. An engineer is just too weak to bring. Sorry! Maybe when I have more guildies we can take you.”

Charity. How mendacious of them.

But I’ve also realized that to some extent they’re right. The engineer is a miserably underperforming class in every venue except sPvP, where there are some acceptable bunker builds. It’s to the point where I don’t want to inflict my engineer on other people. I am at the point where I feel guilty bringing an engineer into a party because I am pretty sure I am doing 1/4 of what anyone else facerolling the keyboard could do.

I have never been so demoralized about a class in a game, ever. I can barely lot onto the engineer at all because I know just how insanely, toxicly bad it is. It’s doubly bad for me becuase my favorite game mode is WvW and my engineer is absolutely useless for WvW, and has been for a long time. Grenades have never been a useful option for light roamer groups, and they probably never will be. And if they are, perhaps? I am not sure I care anymore.

As someone who does “engineering” of the computer, electrical, and mechanical in real life both for hobby and profession, I do not feel much of that tinkerer/maker vibe in the class. Honestly, the Engineer feels like a rich kid who has bought some gadgets and potions but doesn’t really understand how they work. This sort of subjective feel may not be interesting to you, but I don’t think anyone could name a feature of the class that makes you feel like “an engineer.” So even the lore seems lackluster to me. Between that and the “designed to be a sidekick” direction of the class, it’s all such a bummer.

Kardiamond.6952:

@Dispari.3980

You are right.

You can’t judge a class over the forum.

But I would like to precise that necro whining on the forum are about the BUGS, and not the power of the class.

Not true. While there are complaints about minion AI and other issues, there’s a lot of complaining that 1) axe sucks, 2) they do nothing particularly special, partially because 3) fear got nerfed against champions, 4) the traits are largely useless, nonsensical, or counterproductive, 5) other classes are better at pretty much everything. I could go on. My main is a necromancer though, and was my first 80. I play a build that the forum says is “bad,” but I’ve never had problems with it, and I’ve actually enjoyed nothing but buffs every patch!

I find that when I just play whatever I want instead of trying to research what class and build combination does the most DPS, I have a lot more fun. I feel bad for people who state as-fact that there’s only one viable build, or flock to the forums to threaten to quit every patch. They seem to experience a lot of disappointment.

engis suck even as support healing you say lets see my healing turrret heals about 200-250 hp per 8 seconds i could stack it with the elixir gun’s heal and sacrifice a precious utility slot, Warriors have healing shouts wich by the way when i used them healed about 1900-2050 hp every 20 seconds and that was 3 shouts at a time when i used them with about 1026 Healing power. so lets compare around 500-1000 hp every 8 seconds vs 5700-6000 hp every 20-25 seconds plus over 120 might and condition and Fury and 1 condition remove and a 10 vulnerability on nearby enemies(900 range). guardians have their tome of courage with a 30s full hp heal regeneration and protection plus the ton of passive boons and the active ones so how the heck does an engineer compare to that? needless to say theres even better healing and support classes than those previously mentioned so yeah tell wheres engis at as support now.

Why are you just leaving your healing turret out and not immediately detonating it within it’s own water field for a stronger Aoe heal?

Why aren’t you using healing bombs?

Elixer Gun is not a sacrifice of a precious utility at all…it’s a single utility that gives you 5 more utilities, each of them extremily useful. You will be keeping regen on your teammates too with the elixer gun’s toolkit skill.

With a bomb kit and healing turret, you can stack plenty of might, as well as grant retailliation through light combo fields and blast finishers. Super Elixer removes conditions when it pulses, Fumigate removes conditions, toss elixer removes conditions if you trait for it, which you should be doing anyway.

Lifelike.5862:

Why are you just leaving your healing turret out and not immediately detonating it within it’s own water field?

Because it’s a longer cooldown? Most people drop then pickup.

Also, doing this is unreliable. It being unreliable is a known and long-established problem.

Lifelike.5862:

Why aren’t you using healing bombs?

Going more than 10 in inventions is pretty tough to justify given how much better Alchemy is as a tree.

Lifelike.5862:

Elixer Gun is not a sacrifice of a precious utility at all…it’s a single utility that gives you 5 more utilities, each of them extremily useful.

On the Elixir Gun skills

1. is a weak attack that is inferior in every way to other classes weakness delivery, and cannot stack bleeds well.
2. is not bad.
3. is atrociously bad; with terrible damage, mediocre condition removal and application, and all the awkwardness of cone targetting.
4. ’s damage is not bad, but it can be a tricky skill to use in many environments. More than one engineer has jumped to her/his death because the server said “You are pointing this way” and their screen said, “You are pointing THAT way.”
5. is great, even after the nerf, and at least brings condition removal to the table, but most people feel it’d be better as a water field because then it could do appreciable healing. It enjoyed a brief period of popularity because it was nearly as good as Healing Rain, but with a better cooldown.

Healing turret explosion isn’t unreliable if you time it right. I can nail it 100% of the time after some practice, it’s really not hard at all. Drop, delay a bit, then detonate. It works every time so long as someone doesn’t put a field on it right after the water field deploys.

As for healing bombs, if you’re specced for healing, you SHOULD be using the bomb kit and you SHOULD be taking 30 in inventions. I just can’t see any other healing builds for engineer working without the bombs. They bring so much to the table. I use 30 in both alchemy and inventions, but if I had to drop 10 points in one tree I’d probably choose alchemy (because kit refinement with elixer gun can sort of cover for the lack of condition removal if you don’t get cleaning formula.)

As for the elixer gun skills, 1 is still in most cases more useful than your pistol shot and 3 is an additional form of condition removal on top of super elixer. Combined with that and cleansing elixers, you get plenty of ways to remove conditions. Fumigate really isn’t all that hard to use either. Aim, spray, turn the camera in the general direction of whatever you’re spraying. At least one of those ticks is going to hit.

I would admit that super elixer would be better as a water field, but I kind of like it being a light field. I just wish that the duration of the retalliation proc was a bit longer, but an aoe heal would be more useful overall.

Lifelike.5862:

Why are you just leaving your healing turret out and not immediately detonating it within it’s own water field for a stronger Aoe heal?

Why aren’t you using healing bombs?

Elixer Gun is not a sacrifice of a precious utility at all…it’s a single utility that gives you 5 more utilities, each of them extremily useful. You will be keeping regen on your teammates too with the elixer gun’s toolkit skill.

With a bomb kit and healing turret, you can stack plenty of might, as well as grant retailliation through light combo fields and blast finishers. Super Elixer removes conditions when it pulses, Fumigate removes conditions, toss elixer removes conditions if you trait for it, which you should be doing anyway.

thats precisely the point we have to mash the whole keyboard to do what other classes do with 1 or 2 keys and even detonating the turret what would that give everyone else a 2k hp heal every 20s? secondly why must i focus purely on healing and being support if everyone else can heal just fine while doing huge damage? bombs… are somewhat laughtable how would i go walking about in wvw dropping bombs if theres a swarm of people with 1200 range pulls and stuns. have you even seen the pathetic regen the elixir gun gives fun fact is the F key regen actually heals more than the super elixir as it doesnt decrese in power over time, everything you said contributes to my statement in order to do everything you mentioned i’d have to spend 20 points on at least 3 traits to do all the mentioned things. another thing is they are all stationary besides the tool belt regen so those players you want to heal are most likely to run out of the regen.

Lifelike.5862

As for healing bombs, if you’re specced for healing, you SHOULD be using the bomb kit and you SHOULD be taking 30 in inventions.

Fumigate really isn’t all that hard to use either. Aim, spray, turn the camera in the general direction of whatever you’re spraying. At least one of those ticks is going to hit.

The problem with bombs is their explosive radius has been nerfed to having to be right on top of the enemy or friend for them to work correctly. BIG margin for miss. (they don’t even have the same radius as my thief’s sword, i tested this) And then you have to choose two completely useless other abilities to get to that one in the trait line.

Please don’t tell people that the cone attacks like Fumigate work well because we all know it doesn’t this is one of the cone abilities that’s had serious miss problems since before launch and no it has nothing to do with the camera because the cone attacks on the other classes don’t miss like this and FT. There’s something specific to engineers that’s wrong with these two and the p/p torch ability that causes them to miss in this fashion. It doesn’t matter where my camera is on my toon it still misses 40% of the time even when trying to cure friendlies.

It’s really easy to see that it’s not working as intended.

all in all the main issue is Why do we have to fully trait for support and lose big damage and limited skill slots to be on par with other classes . engineer is my favorite class but its more stressful than fun to play specially when i outperform him with my other characters who are 20-30 levels lower. hell i was doing better on my lvl 2 warrior than him on scaling lvl 80 dungeons.

Lifelike.5862:

Healing turret explosion isn’t unreliable if you time it right. I can nail it 100% of the time after some practice, it’s really not hard at all. Drop, delay a bit, then detonate. It works every time so long as someone doesn’t put a field on it right after the water field deploys.

The problem is that there can be disconnects between what a slightly laggy player sees and what the server sees. This has been a problem for a long time.

Lifelike.5862:

As for healing bombs, if you’re specced for healing, you SHOULD be using the bomb kit and you SHOULD be taking 30 in inventions.

Nothing in Inventions helps healing except that specific trait. You’re better off just speccing into tools for extra Super Elixir fields unless your goal is to walk around like a robot saying, “Beep beep boop boop I am a Red Mage from Final Fantasy XI year 1 would you like refresh beep beep boop boop is it clear I am a healbot in this metaphor?” You will be doing nothing worthwhile except tiny extra heals unless you’re also 20-30 into explosives, in which case how exactly are you staying alive?

Lifelike.5862:

I just can’t see any other healing builds for engineer working without the bombs. They bring so much to the table. I use 30 in both alchemy and inventions, but if I had to drop 10 points in one tree I’d probably choose alchemy (because kit refinement with elixer gun can sort of cover for the lack of condition removal if you don’t get cleaning formula.)

Even your described build is mediocre compared to other classes support abilities, and you give up everything for it. You might have noticed this is the complaint with the class right now.

Lifelike.5862:

As for the elixer gun skills, 1 is still in most cases more useful than your pistol shot

Both need tweaks. Both are not very good.

Lifelike.5862:

and 3 is an additional form of condition removal on top of super elixer. Combined with that and cleansing elixers, you get plenty of ways to remove conditions.

Or let the necro do it and hurt the enemy in the process. And if you’re dropping light fields left and right that should be more than enough, anyways.

Actually you’re wrong there. Elementalist cone attacks suffer from the same problem as engineers, particularly lightning whip and fire grab. As far as cone attacks go, Fumigate is one of the more well-behaved ones. I never have any problem landing it compared to flamethrower 1 or Fire grab. Make sure the camera is pointed directly at whatever you’re trying to shoot, since that’s what steers the direction your character is facing.

tigirius.9014:

Lifelike.5862

As for healing bombs, if you’re specced for healing, you SHOULD be using the bomb kit and you SHOULD be taking 30 in inventions.

Fumigate really isn’t all that hard to use either. Aim, spray, turn the camera in the general direction of whatever you’re spraying. At least one of those ticks is going to hit.

The problem with bombs is their explosive radius has been nerfed to having to be right on top of the enemy or friend for them to work correctly. BIG margin for miss. (they don’t even have the same radius as my thief’s sword, i tested this) And then you have to choose two completely useless other abilities to get to that one in the trait line.

Please don’t tell people that the cone attacks like Fumigate work well because we all know it doesn’t this is one of the cone abilities that’s had serious miss problems since before launch and no it has nothing to do with the camera because the cone attacks on the other classes don’t miss like this and FT. There’s something specific to engineers that’s wrong with these two and the p/p torch ability that causes them to miss in this fashion. It doesn’t matter where my camera is on my toon it still misses 40% of the time even when trying to cure friendlies.

It’s really easy to see that it’s not working as intended.

best way to prove this is wvw when you attack sieges and gates (wich happen to be stationary targets) sometimes you just cant hit em at all no matter the angle but its not that the flamethrower is meant to not hurt them because sometimes you can actually hit them successfully

Lifelike.5862:

Actually you’re wrong there. Elementalist cone attacks suffer from the same problem as engineers, particularly lightning whip and fire grab. As far as cone attacks go, Fumigate is one of the more well-behaved ones. I never have any problem landing it compared to flamethrower 1 or Fire grab. Make sure the camera is pointed directly at whatever you’re trying to shoot, since that’s what steers the direction your character is facing.

Inventions has several traits worth getting for a bunker build. +toughness with shields and shield cooldowns is a necessary skill for the healer bomb build, since you will be using the shield’s blast finisher and projectile reflect a lot. Toughness into power is not bad either since you’re already building toughness if you’re going with +healing power anyway (clerics/apothecary armor, etc)

That and Healing bombs…hmm, seems like all traits that directly benefit my build. And no, I am not giving up everything for it either. My build supports, and it does respectable damage for a supposed ‘full-tank’ build while still being very durable.

I dislike getting 10 points in tools because I’m constantly switching to my elixer gun and back as necessary, which means that a lot of the time I’m forced to waste the super elixer proc due to it’s cooldown.