Guild Wars 2

Pretty sure in order to stay fully competitive in any buy to play MMO you also gotta buy the expansions. What GW2 did by giving away the base game free was just a nifty move towards free to play, but there’s still an expansion ya gotta buy to play with that content.

I just hope they consider PvE DPS as well with the sword auto change. Maybe reducing Impossible Odds upkeep by something to compensate, or as mentioned above by shifting some of the damage into #2 and #3.

It’s really the nature of online games in general. There is always a bunch of crap out there that is overshadowed by other things in the same class whether it’s skills, abilities, traits, talents, specializations, masteries, or what not. There are always a few things overshadowed by the optimal things.

Should work be done in the area to make some of these things viable? Probably, but I doubt it’ll ever be near perfect. I don’t really have that expectation. They even have some push to not balance those things due to balance between other classes, in case they overpower something.

Marauder is definitely better off when you lack a friend. Probably better as a whole really.

You would definitely have to be the +1. Could really use Swiftness for that though. Not sure it’s really all that viable at the moment vs. Maurader/Cele Hammer, hopefully I’m wrong.

PierPiero.9142:

Ayestes.1273:

Oh no, I didn’t lose Firearms. I went Explosives, Firearms, and Alchemy. It’s pretty glass cannon, and losing Scrapper sucks.

And you have no speed i suppose ….

Elixir B and Alchemy. It runs out though. Chaith’s variant looks interesting though too.

Oh no, I didn’t lose Firearms. I went Explosives, Firearms, and Alchemy. It’s pretty glass cannon, and losing Scrapper sucks.

Screenshots of scoreboards are fantastic and all, but without some sort of strategy discussion or video context it’s kinda meaningless to me.

I did miss using P/P HGH Nades for condi’s so I gave it a try. Without boon removal though you are a slave to Mal Revs, and Necros are more common then they used to be. Although it’s surprisingly more effective than I thought at getting past Diamond Skin when you have Nades, and when you have repeatable access to every condi except slow and weakness condi removal still has troubles against it. You can melt anything without complete condi wipes or tons of resistance though in seconds still. It’s also a glass cannon surviving only with boons, and a pair of invulns. I did really well with a Condi Rev ally removing boons or Tempest ally covering up my defenses. It ain’t gonna be a meta build though.

http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Engineer_-_Flamethrower_Condi

Something like that. Just gotta be aware of when people have no condi removal left, and you bomb your Burning.

The Marauder Amulet damage is fine as long as they stay on point. It’s mostly about your AoE pressure with skills like Acid Bomb and your hammer skills combined with all your traits. If you are chasing someone or fighting a Bunker it’s still going to take quite awhile to deal with someone though as that’s just the nature of it.

Only problem with going heavy condi now is it’s not just Necros that hard counter you. That and the existence of Resistance without any good boon stripping. I loved my HGH condi burst build, but it’s a little silly now unless you are paired at the hip with a boon stripping class.

It can still be plenty fun, but I had to switch it up due to some frustration.

Patch notes can still make for some interesting days, but I think a lot of the negative attitudes mostly stay quiet now. Which is nice since I’d rather read threads about strategy and min-maxing what we are capable of then complaints. Suggestion threads are great too as long as they don’t turn into a pity party.

If you are going to hit a 50% or 100% breakpoint then it can be a good idea to use Givers to get that point. Otherwise you should value damage above them. Your Burning ticks are the entire reason for that. There are other ways to run Condi builds, but I’ll admit I haven’t changed my build personally in a long time away from a 100% boosted duration build.

It’s definitely a Condi Necro with the Transfers and Corrupt Boon. Other then that it’s up to experience, knowledge, and skill. Even then in team fights I’d rather be the Engineer.

All of the the above mentioned are good choices. A 4/6 Nightmare and 2/6 Lyssa set can also do you wonders for +20% condi-duration only if that let’s you break a threshold of 50% or 100%.

Honestly if you leave any class because you feel they are broken you are going to get the same feeling from an Engineer. Irregardless of that though as long as you have fun with an Engineer then you should keep at one, and playing other classes furthers your knowledge of the game dramatically.

HGH builds are better off then most people seem to suspect, but generally as above there are some very viable and effective bunker and condition builds out there to play with. At least personally I’ve never been able to leave the Engineer and feel as comfortable as I’d like.

Truth be told I’ve always favored Shrapnel and Short Fuse for Zerg Busting with both Bombs and Nades even before the Incendiary Powder change. With Shrapnel having a chance to tick on each tick of Glue, Smoke, and Incendiary Bomb they can actually be pretty effective in Zerg fights. You need to make sure you aren’t providing fields when you are doing buffs though. The same can be said for PvE, as it’s not uncommon to be able to max out the bleed stacks alone while providing perfect uptime of Burn and Poison. For small scale PvP though Incendiary Power is essential in keeping the burn up.

As for the general topic at hand, I still run the old HGH build with Elixir S and B just fine. It’s still very effective and I’ve never had enough of a reason to leave it, even though the Elixir S change in the past caused a rather large exodus. People know how to play against it better, but that just makes it more fun.

To me there is a lot unrefined gunk in nearly every classes traits and skills that yet need to be cleaned out. The Engineer isn’t any different, but it’s much better then it used to be. If that is the reason it feels like a beta to you, then I can see where it’s coming from. It often takes a long time for any MMO to make everything feel polished and clean, and few ever actually do it. The system GW2 has is actually noticeably more difficult to polish and clean too as it’s much more open. You can very much have a lot of gunk left to clean up and yet have a very viable and working class with many effective builds.

I don’t think HGH really left. It just became less popular when Necros received their boosts way back when. I’ve been HGH for what feels like a year (might actually be? I’d have to look at patch notes) and I would generally agree that HGH is still plenty strong. Losing a few extra Might stacks in exchange for some extra bleeds is the only really concern with the patch. The damage still feels roughly the same, but the Might stacks don’t get as high.

I still tend to use the Geomancy Sigil and aim for +50% duration with Lyssa + Nightmare though. I’ve generally noticed that more sources of damage are better then extra Might and those runes and sigils do that. The only reason I never looked at Shrapnel before is because of how low the chance is on it. That is probably the only thing that drives me nuts about it, because I never know if it’s working.

It’ll be easier for everyone to help you if you have laid out what build you tend to run with.

I’ll probably be taking Shrapnel or Exploit Weakness now with my HGH build, but I will admit they feel lackluster. After thinking about it I’ll probably focus on Shrapnel now, but there was a pretty good reason these weren’t considered above Incendiary Powder.

Shrapnel is too unreliable and that’s why people tend to avoid it. A 15% chance is too wild even if the average damage the trait can output is pretty good. In some manner the chance needs to be brought up and either a cooldown placed on it or the duration of the bleed shortened up. It also only works with Grenades and Bombs, so there is that to limit its influence already. It’s also hard to tell if it’s working since it’s a bleed affect among many. Honestly I wouldn’t mind if it was Torment instead of Shrapnel but that’s probably a whole different area of changes.

Exploit Weakness’ problem was two-fold and one of those is solved. 25% meant they were probably already dead, so raising it to 50% helps. The other problem is it’s only a Cripple. Given Glue Shot, Chill Nades, and maybe Glue Bomb if I’m going a little wonky (again, in my HGH builds) I already have the slow affect on someone when I need it, although I’d admit all of these are difficult to land at long range. If I’m engaging someone down to 50% though, they are probably in mid range where my damage is effective and I’ve already got them under some control. It’s obviously got it’s uses, but for the value of a trait slot a mere Cripple doesn’t seem like enough. I haven’t experimented enough with it though, maybe it’ll shine a bit more now that I have some chance to use it. I’d rather it be a significant effect with a decent cooldown though to start considering it above Shrapnel.

I still use Nightmare with Giver’s weapons for +100% in WvW and Nightmare/Lyssa for +50% in sPvP. I probably need to update that, but old habits die hard and Nightmare runes aren’t exactly the easiest to replace iirc.

Elixir S and B with Nades are probably my go to still. I’ve always used Bomb Kit over Elixir S in PvE though with Shrapnel, and often in WvW as well. At least for PvE you alone can keep 25 stacks of bleeds with perma burn and poison on a target. Power variants are probably still more optimal, but I lack a set of decent Power gear now. Rocket Boots and Elixir Gun also graze into the setup once in awhile. I should probably look into testing some other stuff again too.

I generally stick to 30/10/0/30/0 with HGH and Condi’s. Pretty much ever since HGH was buffed long, long ago. Geomancy is still my favorite weapon swap sigil.

I just use fast casting and have gotten used to it. They tend to be inaccurate against players at long range unless they are extremely predictable no matter what you do though. Mid to short range is best for these things, just like the majority of our skills.

Basically you just need to practice and play a bit closer to the opponents.

I’ve stuck to the old HGH build and this patch certainly brings out buffs to it. As stated before though, Bombs are looking mighty interesting again. A long time ago I ran Nades, Bombs, and Elixir B as a somewhat all out offensive variant. I may have to give that a try again.

Kiting them tends to reduce their Clone and Phantasm damage rather significantly. If you can’t pressure them hard with Condi-Dmg then you are going to have to figure out all of their damage avoidance skills and get past them. Unfortunately they can have a whole lot of those.

I probably said it six months ago, but I do think the Engineer downed state should have some conditions attached. Bleeds on the pull and a Burn on the bomb for example. It was also suggested a long time ago that the Pull work like the Harpoon Gun variant and allow you to push yourself backwards if you make contact with someone. That would give it a little more counterplay.

On Swap and On Crit will disable the other if one procs for the duration of the cooldown.

I’d honestly just run either Earth or Geomancy, then add in Corruption. I’m more used to Geomancy with my Engineer, so it’s my preferred choice there.

I’ve been using:
http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-sFwFF;0VKFM0U4kL-60;9;4JTJ;016-12A48;5VN17a;1jwmAjwmA2ZY

Using Discipline is an interesting idea to me, although I’m not sure I’d use those traits. Right now I think I win most fights simply because the opponent doesn’t understand what I’m doing in terms of projectile reflection, rapid condi application, and control with confusion. I feel pretty much all-in when I choose to fight though, and it seems difficult to disengage even with what leaps, charges, and swiftness I have available. Kiting actually doesn’t feel like a problem though. It’s the early stages of testing though.

I used to be an advocate of getting 100% bleed duration, but now I think the best thing is to just stack as much Condi-Dmg as I can. What the build does lack though is Stability. It’s pretty meager in the stomping department, but if I sit on a downed target and use them as bait it works pretty well with Sword cleaves.

Daecollo.9578:

Ayestes.1273:

Daecollo.9578:

Ayestes.1273:

That’s a whole lot of buffs all at once, and extremely high healing values.

I really want to say: So?

So I don’t think anyone is going to take this particular suggestion seriously when it’s so over the top. Especially without any reasoning as to why you feel the Warrior should have such powerful Healing Skills. Why do you think that this should be the way Warrior’s are buffed?

Reread everything I have said in this thread.

You should have that justification in the main post, and even then I read that discussion and was hoping you would elaborate on why you chose those numbers rather then any other. I understand you want the heals boosted and I get why, but to the point where they are around twice as effective as any other heal is where I get lost.

On a side note, I’m pretty disappointed the Healing Cooldown changes didn’t get into this patch. They needed that buff.

Daecollo.9578:

Ayestes.1273:

That’s a whole lot of buffs all at once, and extremely high healing values.

I really want to say: So?

So I don’t think anyone is going to take this particular suggestion seriously when it’s so over the top. Especially without any reasoning as to why you feel the Warrior should have such powerful Healing Skills. Why do you think that this should be the way Warrior’s are buffed?

That’s a whole lot of buffs all at once, and extremely high healing values.

We’ve also been buffed many times alongside those nerfs, and we have some of the best builds out there. I’m not worried.

Bull’s Rush and Shield Bash were enough to make decent use of Distracting Strikes before even when it was in a crappy incarnation. Add Stomp in there as well and it’d be plenty fine. 4 stacks of Confusion over about 10 seconds combined with the tons of Bleed stacks is rather high on the damage, and condi-diversification is always helpful when it’s getting removed. Especially when the Condi-Dmg is between 1550 and 2000 depending on the Might and Corruption stacks.

A Condi-Warrior’s problem was survival and with that getting a bit of a boost things look better off. There is a lot in this patch that would accomplish that. I’m even looking at running a Sw/Sw + Sw/Sh build, just to take advantage of the ridiculous amount of reflecting block I could get. Longbow and Rifle have never really suited me well in condi builds anyway, but I could easily change my mind with that.

It’s not going to be ultra-competitive as far as I’m aware, but it’ll be much more viable for pugging then it previously was. I had a lot of fun with it before, and I think it gets a whole lot more fun. The last time I felt this way was with the Engineer and HGH, and well that turned out to actually be ultra-competitive.

Cleansing Ire, Mending, and Restorative Strength is plenty of Condi-Removal. Signet of Rage and the new Furious Speed is permanent in-combat Swiftness, not to mention Bull’s Charge and Savage Leap for even more speed. Endure Pain, Shield Block, and Riposte are a lot of defensive cooldowns. Flurry, Shield Bash, Bull’s Charge, and Stomp are a lot of control combined with the high Cripple uptime. It actually doesn’t look too bad to me. It’s basically more damage, control, and survival then what it had previously. I’m interested in how it’ll turn out, and I’m not as immediately disheartened as many of you seem to be here.

On an odd note, I imagine it’d actually work really well with an HGH Engi build since Bleed and Confusion stacks would have plenty of room and Burn and Poison would be the Engi’s domain. The high amount of control would lend it well to landing the damage as well.

Manuhell.2759:

Ayestes.1273:

The point is Endure Pain is not immunity. You can still apply control effects and conditions to someone who is under Endure Pain. That means you could interrupt that healing skill or battle standard, while Elixir S and Mist Form made it uninterruptable.

Can’t control if they’ve got stability, and they’ve got reliable means to get that. And shouts are instant anyway (1192+0.8*healing power area heal with the trait, clean a condition with the runes).

Stability is a separate thing entirely though. I thought we were comparing Elixir S to Endure Pain, not Elixir S to Endure Pain plus another Utility Skill. Stability is rather explicit in allowing you to activate anything while being protected from control effects.

As for Shouts, they can’t even be interrupted in the first place because they are instant. I don’t see how using them during Endure Pain makes much of a difference there as it doesn’t use up any time. Not to mention, Shout healing and cleansing is still rather low in comparison to many of the other Support variants out there.

I’m not really sure why you think Warriors are so great in this regard. I played one before ever coming to the Engineer, and frankly the Engineer has been far above the viability of a Warrior for a very long time. In my opinion, Engineers are still plenty better then Warriors in sPvP.

The point is Endure Pain is not immunity. You can still apply control effects and conditions to someone who is under Endure Pain. That means you could interrupt that healing skill or battle standard, while Elixir S and Mist Form made it uninterruptable.

Endure Pain is quite a bit different then Elixir S. Endure Pain does not avoid all the attacks and instead reduced direct damage to zero. That leaves them vulnerable to being applied with control effects and conditions. It also has a longer cooldown then Elixir S.

Honestly, Elixir S is still very good. The nerf was needed.

I think all of the 25% defensive skill trigger traits have that as a weakness. Our’s will cleanse a single condition with 409 at least. Honestly though, I’ve never liked our automatic Elixir S because it interrupts you.

We can maintain permanent Swiftness, high-uptime Swiftness, and/or have access to leaps. Our leaps are a little less frequent and less used than other classes though, so we tend to rely on Swiftness for mobility.

We pretty average for mobility. Not the top, but definitely not the bottom either.

Each finisher can only affect one field, which is typically the first one you have contact with. If you did a leap and blast finisher during that you would receive one Leap+Water combo and one Blast+Water combo.

As to the topic, the Healing Turret via Supply Crate was typically only useful for it’s Regeneration, and that remains the same. It’s not really going to be any different for Supply Crate.

Elixir S is still a complete evade. It’s still our best anti-burst and anti-focus tool. It’s extra dodging that works under absolutely any situation. If dodges are blocks were useful before then Elixir S will remain useful as well.

The ability to do stuff while completely invulnerable was overpowered, especially given its short cooldown. This change was more then needed, and we don’t need to be able to perform actions during Elixir S to win fights.

Confusion is still powerful, but it might not be a good idea to completely focus on it. The damage output that Confusion abilities can still be far above what other skills can do. Keep in mind that it was still pretty good in sPvP, which is where the damage level is now at.

So does any class that intentionally plays with a subset of utilities that aren’t very good, and every class can make a pretty long list of things they’d call useless. Gadget complaints can be done constructively as long as it isn’t going to intrude on any good discussion. Given I haven’t been around these forums for awhile, nor am I really looking too far even now, so perhaps there is good constructive discussion on Gadgets.

This patch was excellent. Everything that needed to be done to HGH was done right, and the myriad of buffs we got are amazing. Healing Turret is incredibly powerful now, and that paves the way towards Bunker builds being much more viable.

This forum goes through the same pattern. We get great patches with tons of buffs and maybe one or two nerfs. Then the forum has a meltdown over the one or two nerfs, irregardless of how consequential or needed they are. It’s the reason I don’t really post anymore, because it’s difficult to get any decent discussion in without three to four people crying about how bad Engineers are. Engineers are actually in a great position relatively to most classes. Obviously they still need work, but I feel like a broken record saying this. Every class needs work.

It’ll likely be a patch with one or two nerfs that everyone will focus on and debate for a month. Then on the side it’ll have a bunch of buffs to a myriad of other things, especially skills and traits that tend to be underused.

I think each downed state profession should have some sort of theme and while they should be generally not that threatening with their #1, the #2 should be moderately threatening and #3 should be an actual threat. There are a few classes that should probably have this look over, but I’d agree the Engineer is one of the ones that need it. The Thief is hard to down, the Warrior gets back up, the Ele repositions very well, etc.

I honestly think our theme should just be high damage on the #2 and #3 skills. Add bleeding, burning, and some more direct damage to them. Maybe the #2 or #3 could bounce your body around or something too, but I really don’t think it’s that needed. It should be dangerous to allow an Engineer to get to that #3 due to the threat of the damage. #2 could also be an AoE cone like effect too, but I’d rather it just be a threatening attack to mix with a theme of dangerous Engineer cooldowns while downed.

Unless things are blatantly offensive, I’d like to think we would rather work towards progress in a corrective and suggestive means. There were a few threads awhile back that according to the forum rules could easily be reported, but instead I just tried to talk them out. Which was for the most part produced a good result.

Also keep in mind that the devs and moderators are different people. The number of infractions on a forum have nothing to do with how often it is being read by the devs.

It’s actually rather clear to me through any discourse they’ve released and through the occasional comment that they do in fact read the class forums. They often choose to comment in the sPvP, WvW, etc. forums instead though as I assume they read that more often. Maybe they could read in more depth and such concerning each class forum, but keeping extreme detail on all eight forums would be mind mindbogglingly difficult I think. I just keep track of this one and I’m sure I miss plenty.

I’ll be honest, I never even had the faintest of ideas that Poison Volley had accuracy issues until I read the forums. Only time I ever thought I missed with it was via user error associated with distance. I’m still not convinced it has accuracy issues above and beyond what is expected in this game, and I’ve been using it almost continually since release. All projectiles have troubles being perfectly accurate at long range in this game, Poison Volley never struck me as any different.

Because they want only certain builds and possibly professions to utilize boon hate. They don’t want boons to be universally weaker. If given to an Engineer, it most certainly will be tied to something specific and not global.

I haven’t tested it out of combat anytime recently, but I do know that Elixir H gave the 2 HGH stacks immediately on use, and then the Enhance Performance 3 Might stacks often lagged behind in being delivered. They were delivered though. I haven’t been that active lately though outside of WvW, since I’ve been playing through Bioshock Infinite, so I can’t be positive it isn’t some recent bug in the patch.

Fine does not mean we don’t need changes or fixes. Fine is a relative term. Relative to the other classes we are fine. That does not mean that we nor the rest of the classes need no more changes by any means. We are fine in the terms that this class is fun and is functional in contrast to the rest of the game.

I’m happy to discuss changes that I feel Engineers need. I’m not happy to discuss how awful we are, because that’s simply a pity party and accomplishes nothing. Detailed discussion on changes and problems is helpful and illuminating. If your focus is truly to help the Engineer, that should be what is discussed. Optimism trounces pessimism in terms of anything being constructive on text forums.