Engineer’s homing missile, Harpoon gun #1, isn’t just the slowest projectile / ranged weapon underwater, it is also missing some targets 100% of the time.
You can repeat this bug easily. Waypoint to Twoway loop point at Frostgorge Sound. There should be some undersea ice wurms and undersea ice wurm hatchling next to this waypoint. Fire harpoon gun #1 at them. The homing missile misses 100% of the time, but e.g, harpoon gun #2 and #4, grenade kit, elixir gun etc. can hit the target. Perhaps the skill should be renamed Missing Missile?
I also did some tests:
Harpoon gun #1 does 13 attacks in 20 seconds, so the actual firing rate is once per 1.5 seconds
Elixir gun #1 tool tip says above ground 3/4 s, but underwater it says 1/4. I did the same test: 22 attacks in 20 seconds, same under water and above water. So the actual attack rate is about is once per 1.1 seconds
Thus EG #1 underwater tool tip is wrong. The EG #2, Elixir F, tooltip is wrong as well. I have +80% condition duration and it says 9 s cripple, but in reality the cripple seems to last around 5.5 seconds.
Mind you, these tests were performed using the rifled barrels trait (increases range to 1200).
I would rather see harpoon gun #1 doing 50% less damage than it does now, but firing at higher rate (1/2 s) and having faster projectile speed and hitting the targets reliably, instead of the current state.
Harpoon gun #5, netwall, is really quirky to use in pvp situation the slow projectile speed and needing to time it yourself. This is however not a bug. Just a nuisance.
I cannot tell the exact date when the stealth nerf / change the grenades occured, but already for more than a month their spread under water has been increased. You can fire the grenades at stationary or very slowly moving targets. The grenadier grandmaster trait makes you throw 3 grenades at a time and 8 with grenade barrage (toolbelt skill). At further than 200-300 range only 2 out of 3 grenades hits the same target. At 1000+ range it is typical that only one grenade hits the same target. Effectively cutting the damage to 1/3. While this is not big a problem fighting against mobs of underwater NPCs and monsters, it is a real problem when fighting against other human players. The grenades travel slowly. Thus you don’t even need to dodge them, just strafe / kit side ways to avoid them. Now a lot of 3x grenades are all missing.
I have analyzed my underwater combat logs a lot and found out that at long range even 70%-80% of the grenades can miss in a real life combat. All three grenades can miss a downed opponent at around 1000 range. A downed opponent is unable to dodge and his kiting speed is greatly reduced, thus the grenade spread / hitting is truly broken underwater. Bomb kit #1 does clearly more damage than grenade kit #1 even if all 3 grenades hit and both have as fast firing rate. Thus grenade kit skills need to be fixed, because current bomb kit offers much better real life dps than grenade kit.
Grenade barrage, the tool belt skill, is more or less useless underwater as those 8 grenades fly to all different directions. Sometimes several of them hit at closer than melee range, but sometimes all of the 8 grenades fail to hit an NPC underwater monster which is swimming next to the engineer!
The WvWvW players of my server have given me titles like “lord of the lake” or “king of the lake”, “best underwater fighter EU”. This is a bit of exaggeration, but I really love the underwater combat and it is difficult to defend such title. I am now forced to use bomb kit a lot (melee range only) and rotate with elixir gun, harpoon gun (never using #1). I rarely use toolkit underwater.
Bomb kit tool belt skill, big ol’ bomb, has a strangely long aftercast delay underwater. This doesn’t seem to occur in LA, but it always occurs on any WvWvW borderland map. Above ground big ol’ bomb acts normally, but underwater there is around 1.5 second after cast. Please remove this after cast! This skill is very much needed to kill enemy rangers, because their dead pet can still revive them (ranger underwater lick wounds downed skill is bugged). I need to CC the pet away from the range to score the kill.
Thank you!
PS. If other players know any other underwater bugs, please add to this thread.
(edited by Deniara Devious.3948)