Guild Wars 2

- Crafting system – GW2’s crafting system is better than most but still does lack difficulty which would make it more entertaining instead of a grind. Look to EQ2 at launch for an example of skill based crafting before they nerfed it so you couldn’t fail at crafting. Also, all the crafting professions relied on eachother for materials needed in their combines which aided in the socialization/community as well. I believe unless we go back to UO’s style of gear is destructable crafting will never be quite right. Its hard to have an economy based on items each player only needs once.
– Grouping and socializing. Raids and groups and instancing are horrible for socialization. There is no sense of being a part of a community. Even guilds are limited. GW2 has done a great job at bringing strangers together for a common purpose. I have not had a community feeling like this since EQ1.
– Open World PVP – This exists in GW2 is called WvW all the open field pvp you want. Running across random strangers to fight, its there. Grouping up with lots of others to assult settlements and bases, it has that too.
- Role-Playing – RPers will RP if there is a seperate server for them or not. Its too time consuming to moderate that only RPers are in the RP server. Its just easier to let this minority community form their own boundaries within your world than try to segregate them.
- Player/Player interaction – This should be in the game. Only reason I see for not having it is so that players HAD to use the TP if they wanted to have a secure trade.
- Casual activities – I don’t have time to put into these anymore but they should be there to entertain the people who put more than 50 hours a week into the game. I know what you mean these activities that are just there to spend time with someone without it feeling like your sitting in a chat room typing to them are nice. I would add mini games to the list of possible casual activities too.
- Interface customization – This should be there, I expect it got axed due to investor pressure to release early. Currently no need since I only look at the UI to see if I’m ready for the next fight, once in the fight I practically have my firing sequence memorized.
– The traveling system – I like the option of either hoofing it or just getting there already for a nominal fee. If there was persistant PVP you would have to have no instant travel so there is opportunity to gank people traveling but since persistant PVP is contained in WvW it doesn’t detract to have the portals in my opinion.

- The Endgame concept – WoW and most MMOs is all about getting to top level as fast as you can then doing content. The only reason there are raids and dungeons at lower than top levels is because they are at levels that used to be top levels. If you just grind past those levels to the new top level all of that old content and gear are obsolete.

- Being distinctive and untouchable – There are games that reward players who spend more time in game than most people do working as you mentioned. I am glad this is not yet one of them. I still have the sence of individuality though as there are several players in WvW that are always excellent fights and thus draw instant aggro from me when I see them. They managed to find ways to look unique, may just need to get creative with it. Also, it does no good to look unique in GW2 if you don’t have the skills to be memorable.

They have several production teams. That is why there is haloween content because there is a production team assigned to work on seasonal/temporary content and another for bug fixes and another one for working on expansions.
The lack of bug fixes is distressing to be sure especially when there is so much low hanging fruit (small easy bugs). I have seen and heard of some bugs that got fixed but never made the patch notes. It would help ANet if they told us everything to at least know how much they are really fixing looks bad only seeing a few fixes per day. The fact that so many balance issues and so many traits and skills were so obviously bugged at release is odd. Makes you wonder what the beta folks did? Some of the bugs I have seen are ones that should have been caught in Alpha let alone Beta.

I say give them time (at current rates LOTS). In the long run its only 60 dollars/euros I already have more gameplay out of this than many other games I paid the same for.

Wow, even being an engineer who loves to complain I can’t stand behind these claims. Grenades are fine, everything else is a little behind… turrets are even further behind.

Disclaimer: I don’t use elixer gun, not my style so it could be good bad or indifferent and I wouldn’t know.

There seems to be some difficulty finding the right time to patch servers since there are prime times all around the globe. Here is an idea for solving this dilemma.

1) Have 2 login servers (sets of login servers) and have the old build on one and the new build on the second.

2) Use metrics to isolate when each server is at its historically lightest user load (Since WvW exists you will have to consider all 3 servers competing as a single server and find the time that works best for those 3 combined)

3) Inform players at least an hour in advance of when their server will be switching over. Since you now know ahead of time from step 2 this is possible. Its even possible to assign a set time that a patch will happen each week.

4) Switch each server group over to the login server(s) with the new build as its lightest user load time is reached.

5) If a player switches from a server with the new build to a server with the old build the old build log in servers should download the old build so that player can play until their new server reaches its lightest user load time and gets converted to the new build.

Let me know if you see any issues with this.
Seems this would resolve a fair amount of resentment from the players about peak time and unannounced server drops.

When you have view backpack toggled to off then put on a kit a backpack still shows up.

Priority: low (graphical/appearance only)

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/engineer/Backpacks-Kits/first#post503511

This may be a bug. There is an option when wearing a backpack to toggle it on or off. Perhaps the kit packs are supposed to follow that backpack toggle but do not due to a bug?

Anet,
Even if it kit packs were not originally intended to follow the back pack toggle it would be a nice feature to implement and likely a quick fix.

BUILDS:
Since you are a thief you likely have enough of the glass cannon play style (Grenadier build for Engys) so I will comment on the other play styles of the Engineer. Grenadier is not quite up to Thief or Warrior burst dmg but it is AoE and works well.

Rifle/Turret build is very common for leveling up the Engy as the turrets will attract aggro and allow you to blast away while the NPC’s attack your turrets. Some people use this build for sPVP and WvW but it is less popular as people generally wish more stun breaks and mobility. This set up is usually precision +power + either vitality or toughness based. Gives some survivability with a decent 35-45% crit chance and lackluster dmg with your weapon but turrets suppliment this. This is a good distracted player build that doesn’t take much skill for when you aren’t fully tuned in and just meandering though some content.

Pistol/pistol condition dmg builds are out there and offer good burst and great mobility but are again either glass cannon or only half hearted survivability since so much goes into making the condition damage optimized. Not quite a necro or ele condition setup but its workable.

Pistol/Shield Bunker build goes for max survivability and usually bombs invulns and knockdowns to give time to heal when needed. Fun build and awesome when defending a static point like in sPVP. Not quite a guardian bunker but its workable.

Pistol/Shield Offensive build (yes offensive with a shield) relies on condition dmg and kits to deal dmg then utilized the shield for invuln and stun while condition dmg is ticking away. It also allows the best weapon combo finishing options we have. Kits and skills give us a few more but for weapons you get projectile finishers on all weapons and the shield has a blast finisher. So for skilled combo utilizing players pistol/shield with some kits trade outs for the fields you want over lots of options without switching much, and good survivability with the invuln and usually have a vitality or toughness built into build to give more hp. Truely the jack of all trades, you can kill so not purely bunker defence, but just not fast like a glass cannon build, plus you have many combo options to get you into or out of a wide range of situations.

DISLIKES:
-I don’t see “we need an engy” like I do some of the other classes. Still get groups fairly quickly but its nice to be NEEDED some times.
-Because we have many situational skills I get caught with the wrong skills for the job on quite often. Sieging a tower with a mortar and thowable turrets only to get flanked and need the supply drop, stun break and grenades/bombs. Attacking a supply camp but timer isn’t up so need condition dmg have to back out and switch in call owl and rifle turret.
-Wondering why your rifle isn’t auto firing then realizing your kit is still on from toggling it for mobility.
-Lack of viable options for elite skills 99% of the time you end up with supply drop. Mortar for sieges with lots of defenders. Then immediately back to supply drop. Racial skill snow leapord for running down a straggler. Then immediately back to supply drop. Whirlwind/poison cloud underwater 50/50 chance of getting the good one, roll the dice to see if you fight or run.
-Some skills have random abilities. You often get the ability you didn’t want. Plenty of good options other than the random ones for those who don’t like them though.

In summary, There are many good commonly used builds out there and when you look at the videos of the builds you will commonly see people say “This slot can be whatever suits your playstyle” as there are a lot of skills and traits which are equally viable in the builds. We are not out of options for builds yet I see new builds out there every time I do my weekly sweep. Most are situational at best but due to our wide range of skills and traits that are actually useful and functional we have the option of being creative. Not all classes get that. Every one of our builds has another class that does it a little better but we get to choose between all of them.

Hope this helps.

I love my engy! I complain everywhere else because I care! The squeeky wheel gets the grease so if we didn’t complain none of the bugs would get fixed. It doesn’t mean we don’t love our engy’s.

I love the wide variety of skills we have and find myself impatiently awaiting combat timers to end so I can switch out skills when changing from Sieges, to mob vs. mob fighting withdrawls, to siege defences, to routing chases. I change skills alot. So much fun to dig into your extensive bag of tricks and say hey I forgot about that! Lets throw it on for a bit and see if it works with this one.

Love turrets, people seem to think they are broken…. I like em already if they get buffed all the better.

I originally chose my engy for the survivability. Love running into a group of 5 people final blowing a downed enemy then running away laughing.

Thanks for making this post. Love the engy love.

Was a no kit rifleman for a while so I know what your dealing with. The issue is not with most thieves if they don’t invis every 5 seconds you should be able to survive until they are visible and we do well at CC at that point.

The issue lays in the ones exploiting the 100% invis builds (invis every 5-7 sec because attacking while invis [in WvW at least] only brings them out of invis on their screen, the uninvis message is in a queue of lots of other messages waiting its turn to be sent to all the enemies they are attacking while still invis.
The no kit rifleman is very weak against this as we don’t have much AoE. I ran around with an Ele to solve this and eventually gave in and started using the grenadier setup and all of a sudden I don’t have an issue with thieves anymore unless i’m busy killing someone and they sneak in to attack while i’m distracted. (i could probably survive this but I get serious tunnel vision that gets me killed alot)

I suggest power vitality toughness build for max survivability, and turrets for extra AoE’s when you explode them. Be sure to take the tool belt skills cause static discharge skill because both detonating your turrets and firing their tool belt skills send a static discharge. Just pick a target other than the thief and kill it while dropping your turrets and blowing them up for static discharge and the thief will get AoEed or have to stay back. If your 1v1 against an invis thief use the turrets explode mode as extra AoE and move towards your other party/guild members. I could usually last several minutes if they stayed away from the AoE or kill them if they attacked anyway. Net and rifle turrets are lowest recharge times, thumper turret special ability can be used as another AoE and its tool belt is an AoE and a blast finisher used with your med turret tool belt skill for AoE healing.

It is rough without kits. I dislike being just like everyone else but when you have one option that is just so above and beyond other options its hard to stay strong and cripple yourself for long.

Quote: “Thieves are as easy to kill as any class. They have light armor and are at the bottom rung of the ladder in Hp pools. They are no harder to kill then any other class.”
Theives wear medium armor just like us. And have have lots of the greatest armor currently availible (invisibility).

Rifle, net turret, elixer B, slick shoes, supply drop
Lots of CC (Creature control) with nets, knockdowns, and stuns and wittle them down with rifle.

Very potent 1v1 and ok in a zerg.

Weakness is theif using 100% invis exploit as you only have 1 rifle ability and your elite that hits AoE. Thieves not using the exploit are easy in 1v1.

Don’t forget you can switch out your selected traits while out of combat. Use what is useful for the situation you are in. Don’t get caught in open field combat with Mortar equiped to be sure (hate when I forget to switch back to supply drop after a siege). I run around with an ele almost all the time so I set up the mortar in range of the entire side we are sieging and he calls out targets which I blast off the wall with 5 then cripple/slow and he kills them. When everyone gets the point and stops getting near the edge we work together to kill siege close enoght to hit with splash damage of wall hits but not readily visible.
For gate defence I use the flame thrower for attacks through the gate and when they aren’t pressed up against the gate I go outside and taunt them into attacking me and getting inside the siege range since mortar and grenades can barely if at all be used to reach the ground.

I like the mobile kit idea. I wouldn’t use it except in the same situations I already use the immobile one.
I also like the increased range even if it was for less duration it needs the range more than the duration.
I like the mechanical suit idea, but think that should replace the Elixer X instead since its two random abilities that are each useful in different situations is annoying and thus underused.
I like the idea of a artillery barrage targetable sky drop ability with just the 5 ability but on a shorter timer.

I kind of think they originally meant the ability to drop a mortar like the ones purchased in keeps and towers but the ability to place it anywhere led to too many balancing issues

There are many time zones but there are still peak times where more players are on than other times. Weekends are peak times round the clock and are thus not good patch times. Tuesdays through Thursdays are generally the least active and thus best for patches.

Patches should be scheduled. This was not scheduled as can be seen by the lack of patch notes and no in game warnings 1 hour, 30 min, 15 min, and 5 min from patch time. And by the lack of information about it on the dev forums.

Now you know, and knowing is half the battle!