A man in northern Gendarren was shot roughly 20 times in 1995 and lived to tell about it. The part-time rapper Sgt. Kohler was shot nine hundred times in 2000 and has since released three albums (I skewer your heart recently made platinum). And in 2006, Bandit Boss Keith survived 19 gunshot wounds during the 50-shot fusillade that killed undercover Seraph Bobby Bell.
While surviving numerous gunshots could be a miraculous feat, doctors who have treated gunshot victims say that being shot is not automatically a death sentence.
When major organs — the heart and brain especially — and blood vessels are avoided, the chances of survival are good, they said. The catch, of course, is that there is no science to preventing a bullet from hitting a vital part of the body if the shooter has the proper skill.
“It’s a matter of total, straight class,” said Dr. Vinny A. R. E. NaNet, the former chief medical examiner in Clawrr Island, L.A., and the author of a book on gunshot wounds first published in 1985.
“One bullet can kill you,” he said, “but only if you’re a warrior. Otherwise I think you’re pretty good.”
Which is less played, the engineer or the necromancer?
I’m actually curious, because I rarely see either.
Honestly? I’ve been playing Dark Souls for the past few weeks.
Been a fun time. Yay Christmas gifts.
It’s still mediocre damage, so you may want to wait until stats on weapons effect kits at least. The sigils DO help and lead to some interesting build ideas though, especially ones utilizing might.
And there will always be occasions when switching to another weapon will be preferred. Even thieves will bust out the pistols when they need the distance.
Speargun, like the rifle, is best used in close range. I am not joking. The mines from #2 can all hit a melee target upon firing and will do considerably decent damage, and the torpedos actually have homing so they tend to follow even if the player tries to dodge away.
That being said the only skill I’ve reliably landed from range is time bomb, which is quick and versatile. The net can be awkward since you have to trigger it yourself, but it can make a discouraging wall in between you and a player. Someone mentioned tool kit, and it’s true, magnet really can be useful underwater, and the “box of piranhas” is hilarious. Also if your back is against a wall and they’re in range, try using the speargun’s grapple attack and then swimming forward. Your opponent will have their face pulled into the wall while you swim behind them and there has never been a case where this hasn’t completely disoriented anyone I fought with underwater.
Also don’t discount Elixir X, even if it’s random. As someone who prefers direct damage I generally favor the whirlpool form, but even the withering plague doubles your HP total while in effect which can help your harrassment efforts.
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Honestly blueprints shouldn’t be soulbound at all. I can’t tell you how annoying it is to have all those jump puzzle siege plans in my bank that I can’t use because I play Wv3 on my mesmer instead of the engineer I used to get them.
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.
I just want to say that this has never happened to me. I pug Fractal 10 every night for the daily (usually using gw2lfg), and I’ve never been kicked from a party for being an engineer. It’s also true I’m running a 50% tough/zerker split, as well as a juggernaut/rifle skill build, so my DPS isn’t over-the-top awesome, but I am easily a survivor, capable of safely ressing teammates with Elixir S (which is actually what I most often use it for), and fully capable of setting every mob on fire for extended durations.
And it’s not like engineers aren’t viable at all. Two days again I ended up in a Fractal 10 pug consisting of three engineers and two mesmers, and OF COURSE the fractal pattern we got was Ascalon -> Dredge -> Grawl (and Jade Quarry, of course). And we still managed it fine, even if the first two especially were areas I would have liked a melee (protip: gear shield + elixir S are lifesavers when standing on a switch). Granted we were definately more cautious as we went along, but we succeeded.
If people are actually kicking engineers from a party, then you need to consider it to be due to one of following things. Either:
1) The party members are complete kittens and think player skill accounts for less than player class selection.
2) The party members are absolutely terrible and cannot succeed unless they try to stack the group to carry their inadequacy (ie. peace of mind).
3) You are running a build the group just doesn’t need, be it support, condition spec, or whatever else can become bloated if too many people in the group are running it.
4) You’re actually either a glass-cannon build or just a mediocre/terrible player and the party knows this.
I admit this may be more valid for higher fractals, where parties ARE very choosey about who they bring (I have only been as high as 17, but that’s on me). I can understand this, though I can’t imagine being kicked if you still have 10 agony resist or more.
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A zerg still requires a modicum amount of strategy to succeed. To be successful, as zerg must:
1) Be able to gather and use supplies appropriately. A zerg full of players who cannot use supply is doomed to fail at life.
2) Be able to set up siege appropriately. A zerg that places only rams or catas in reachable locations is destined to be stymied by enemy catapults or arrow carts.
3) Be able to run back for more supplies if the first siege attempt is destroyed. This is very important; how many times have you seen a zerg just mill about attacking the gate and defenders after the rams/cata were destroyed? How many more went for more supply to rebuild the catas in a better location?
4) Not be distracted by the tiny group of guerrillas. Zergs are often split or broken up by small strike teams of survivors who attack from a flank and draw a large portion of players away as they chase after them.
5) Be able to hold their gains. Zergs that cannot keep what they have taken are simple karma trains, and while they pass like a storm thier effects are minimal. “Scorched Earth” planning doesn’t work exceptionally well in Wv3.
6) Be able to watch their rear. It’s a sad zerg that can’t see behind itself while focused on a gate/wall.
7) Be able to break off and take out that kitten treb/mortar/siege. A zerg that continually slams against an objective without at least five freaking AoE’s circling around to at least TRY to take out the treb in the back of the tower is pretty stupid.
A zerg that can do all this is actually the best force on the Wv3 map. While everyone wants to win a Napoleonic battle of Austerlitz with amazing strategy and inferior forces, the game mechanics and of course player base make this very difficult, so more often than not while “greater numbers” seems like the simplest solution, it is also largely the best one, assuming it’s a greater number of people who can think rather than more bodies on the pile.
Magnet Pull is very dependant on terrain. To launch a person into the air, pull them while you’re standing on a slightly higher elevation and they’re a little below you, but not on an actual incline. You need to be on a level cliff with like a little ramp down and them on a level plain beyond that (like a little ramp in the way). This will launch them every time, and is a lot of fun.
For the stopping halfway, if there are any obstructions or uneven ground, these will often trip them and cause them to fall halfway. If you’re on the lower elevation plane in the above example they will often stop half-way as well when they “fall” while being pulled. You cannot pull through obstructions level to the ground (think fences, barrels, and rocks), and “falling” along the way stops their movement (which is where terrain issues come in).
Pulls in general are pretty weird, as when pulling off a wall you clearly see the lateral portion of the pull occur before most of the vertical, but in other locations where both are on inclines this is obviously not the case. In essence I believe it’s using a similar pathing mechanic as teleport skills which typically travel along the ground and are interfered with by terrain gaps and elevation changes, instead of something like a leap attack that ignores such things.
You may think dropping the bomb with bomb kit is meh, but it’s one of the only two refinements to not have a cooldown (at all). That’s a fully spammable bomb, there.
Med kit’s effect is the only other refinement without a cooldown.
Totally agree. OP gets it.
Regarding what the class should become, because Grenades and Bombs are half way there anyway, Engineers should be the big risk / big reward class: they could very well miss, but if they hit, BOOM!
I think this is true to real life engineers anyway. The US Army Corps of Engineers has a lot of grand successes and phenomenal failures.
The thing that gets me the most is they aren’t even using real physics or anything close to that. Sure I get that explosives would be very bad if they hit us while we were using them but what I’m specifically talking about is the explosion radius. Since when does a grenade not explode larger then the radius they gave to my thief’s sword or my warriors 2 hander? How does that even make sense? It’s like they WANT us to miss. We already have that problem with FT/EG/Torch thanks we don’t need to miss with everything.
/facepalm
They seriously need to hire a prior military munitions officer so they can get some real answers on how this class should behave. Then maybe we’ll get some justice.
To be fair, when was the last time you saw a rifle or pistol fire infinite rounds without reloading? Or a crate not only fall out of thin air but break apart and self-deploy unharmed autonomous robots on impact?
Flash grenade ought to be your indication; they’re not as much grenades as they are very powerful fireworks. Hell, they’re all IMPACT grenades for crying out loud! Do you know how impact grenades are delivered in reality? They’re fired from a grenade laucher or rifle attachment, or propelled via firing systems like an RPG rocket. You don’t “throw” impact grenades because of the dangers that occur when handling them as they’re armed; you throw time-delayed ones instead!
So yeah, if you’re looking for any analogue to actual military hardware, you might as well walk out the door. Rifles here can be shotguns, bomb explosions have friendly-fire options turned off and can even make you feel better, and drinking chemical mixtures can temporarily shrink you or turn you into a tornado. But isn’t that the joy of a fantasy setting? Engineers in game are a modern theme with a completely magical twist, not unlike the Asura golems, and that’s kind of a part of their charm.
How to get PvE’ers into WvW?
Vendors in Stonemist and in enemy borderland garrisons that sell unique pretty armor and vanity pets.
One of your lower-line traits that causes an ability when you equip a kit, I forget its name. When you equip tool kit it auto performs a box of nails attack. I assume your PvP build has the trait and other builds don’t.
I can’t respect Tim Drake as the only reason he survived his murder was because Superboy Prime punched reality. It seriously doesn’t matter what they do with Drake, or even if they rebooted the universe, but I simply can’t get past that.
I kind of see engineers more as Spoiler, contanstly trying unorthodox plans in efforts of proving ourselves as valid as our predecessors (ie, the other classes), but eventually getting scolded and then fired (ie. nerfed) for not playing by the mentor’s rules. Then many of us fake our death (ie. quit playing engineers) until the class is fixed at a later date, at which point we will all come back and take on the role of Batgirl (because we feel pretty).
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I’ve seen it where people just kept running out the front entrance of their spawn into the waiting campers, and I figure when this happens it’s obvious they just want to fight and don’t care where they do it. If they wanted out they would either take one of the two camp exits and sneak out to a side.
And if all three exits are being camped then you may as well not be on that map. Go away, as you can accomplish nothing, and then the campers will become bored with nothing to do and also leave. Then you can come back if you like.
That feeling you get while in a zerg as you steamroll the opposition? About like finding 20 cents in the street.
That feeling you get while a zerg steamrolls over you? Like getting mugged for those 20 cents.
That feeling you get while PvE’ing in the Wv3 map and someone completely trounces you small-scale? Like the mugger spit on you while he took it.
That feeling you get when you encounter a small group and triumph? Like finding $20 on the ground after the mugger left.
That feeling you get when you use siege to creatively break into a well-defended location? Like finding out that $20 is actually $100.
That feeling you get when you and a small group successfully use siege to defend a location against huge odds for longer than 10 minutes? Like spending that $100 on something really awesome.
That feeling you get when you become a commander and try to lead your forces to victory? Like being the mugger when he realizes all he got out of it was 20 cents.
Screw the cannon, give me spammable homing spider mines!
To be fair those princess dolls tear almost everyone up, especially in groups. I opened a present and five of them popped out and screamed and suddenly I had no less than SIXTEEN stacks of confusion. I shot my rifle and half my HP total was suddenly gone, and I was just like “what?”
But yeah, it’s not just engineers who have trouble with the toys solo, other classes do as well. Ventari hits hard, the princess’s have a really mean confuse, and the soldier… well, the soldiers are ok but they can still be a problem in a group if you let the mortar hit. Haven’t seen the griffons in the field yet.
Not to debunk your complaint, but you probably want a better example than the toy princess.
Why does our class gimmick as it pertains to elixirs include a long throwing animation and slow cast speed to target in addition to a tiny AoE range for its RNG effect?
There are some really great toolbelt skills available, but with the exception of possibly Elixir H’s I don’t think any of our thrown elixir skills can be included with them.
The idea was (and still is) to spam 1 until the other cooldowns were up, so shrapnel would get tossed a lot (fast cooldown), freeze and blind when needed (freeze was good damage and spread anyway), and poison on the blue moon that it was finally available again. Also barrage, because there is never a case when barrage isn’t the most useful grenade ability available (excluding underwater >_>).
But while waiting for cooldowns you were either spamming 1 or switching to the rifle because the target was moving around too much to get a circle under. What many people now feel is that they’re better off switching to the rifle regardless of the target unless they specifically want to stack vulnerability, and both options feel mediocre compared to what they can do on other classes.
I hope this changes when stats begin to effect kits, but even I will admit it is positively DEMORALIZING to have to throw 16-18 grenade #1 (that’s 42-54 actual grenade hits) in order to kill a single Risen Thrall.
I’d like to ask Anet:
Why are the charr toy mortars way more durable than our turrets?
Because they were designed by an Asura Wintersday genius in a giant blimp-mecha, likely from material so rare that you can only get it farming instances inside the same blimp-mecha.
Totally agree. OP gets it.
Regarding what the class should become, because Grenades are half way there anyway, Engineers should be the big risk / big reward class: they could very well miss, but if they hit, BOOM!
I think this is true to real life engineers anyway. The US Army Corps of Engineers has a lot of grand successes and phenomenal failures.
Real engineers worth the title don’t cause catastophic failures, they cause situations in which their redundancy measures kick in. Upper management typically leads to catastrophy by completely dismissing engineer concerns and/or not allowing said redundancy.
Real-life engineers by and large are not in their profession because they’re experimental scientists, but rather practical implementators of physical law. They know how things are supposed to work and try to make them work in the ways they want, but random results are never an intended outcome of any engineering project anywhere (though in retrospect this might be more a criticism for RNG than anything else).
It occurred to me while playing a well known dungeon crawler that subsequently also has an engineer class in it, that engineers on this game would benefit from the design they used on the other game.
Holy kitten the hoops I would jump through to get spider-mines!
Mobile AoE knockback… I’d use it! Or I’d try it out, at least. Supply Crate is mainly for the daze anyway (and the net turret), so I wouldn’t mind popping mortar just to blast a group apart or off a cliff.
hardly mobile: once you set it up, it stays put.
And you better hope no ranged sees you, or it is destroyed in a few hits.
Not that you have a melee range by the way, you can not hit anything too close.
Furthest reach is 1400 since the trait still doesn’t work.I honestly believe a mine would be a LOT more effective to do what you suggest: throw some of a cliff.
Mortars need to be positioned somewhere entirely safe, but also within reach.
There hardly ever is such a place in any fight.Inside a keep door perhaps, for defense… but than a flamethrower or grenades are doing the job just as well.
My comment was in response to the ones above it suggesting changing mortar into something like a rocket launcher, letting you move with it (essentially making it a type of limited-use kit like the conjured elementalist weapons). I’m perfectly aware of how kitten terrible the mortar is currently.
Replace arrow carts with kitten launchers. They shoot kitten all over the place to demoralize invaders.
Whether or not I actually typed kitten is left up to your imagination.
Golem plans and other free siege are why I still do the jumping puzzle. The 15 or so badges don’t hurt, either.
It’s a shame that SF who isnt outmanned has to wait and spawn the NPC champion to take towers. It’s even numbers out there late night fellas. .
It’s a shame that DR who isnt outmanned has to wait and spawn a dozen siege golems to take garrisons. lol look how many of u it took to kill us
You act like not having the outmanned buff somehow means we have the supply to gain a foothold in the map. Like somehow us not being outmanned makes it so you guys don’t have the towers maxed out with waypoints in all the keeps. Our lack of extra karma and experience from events is draining you guys of supply so you can’t just keep repairing or out-siege us. Or the lack of outmanned means when you guys see that one of your towers is under attack you won’t bring half your server over to respond to it.
You do good ONE week and suddenly you’re big man in the house. Well, I wish you and your guildies the best of luck when you get in a balanced matchup.
Such melodrama. I wasn’t there, but I’ve been seeing a lot of siege golems we’ve been making and also different strategies we’ve been testing. The truth is, it’s not about you or Henge or anything else. It’s that we’re BORED. BORED BORED BORED. We expected a challenge, but it turned out we are going to have to wait another week to get through the servers that have pop changed. So we’re trying fun things like building golem armies, portal bombing, some of our commanders are off completing pve achievements. We’re just bored bored bored. We’re not going to be like “Oh these poor guys, let’s back off and only send an equal number of people to fight them because we care about their feelings and emotions and don’t want to crush them.” That’s not the way this works and that’s not the way life works. We’re using this week as a testing ground since we have such a breather from fighting Kain and Ferg that it allows us to test strategies and play goofy things like golem armies.
What server have you been playing on? There is at least one particular commander who typically does/did almost nothing except golem armies (which often ended up wiped to Ferg defenses) and karma trains (when numbers weren’t massive). Golem armies are absolutely nothing new, especially for DR, and I think you may be rationalizing from perspective? In their defense though THEY’RE FUN, and you can’t begrudge the server for having fun with what they’re doing.
It is also absolutely true that DR isn’t going to back off and make it easy. I was so starved for some tower defense that when a guildie mentioned in chat that someone was attacking a tower he was upgrading I immediately dropped what I was doing in PvE and ran there full-speed to get in on the action! All I could think was “yay, finally!”
Then Wv3 was closed down for an update and everyone was booted, and my spirit died a little more on the inside. :-/
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not much of a surprise. Anet has already made it clear enough that Warrior is their favorite class and they want it to be better than all others. just surprised they havent given it stealth, teleport, and a machine gun.
Please! They still want warriors to party at least sometime, hence why they’re given a number of blast finishers (including every banner), but only one type of combo field (fire, for might stacking). Let the other classes lay out the smoke field and they’ll stealth the party with stomp/earthshaker/bannerofX/etc. SYNERGY!
Incidentally they have a faux-teleport; it’s sword skill #2, which is a leap attack (Savage Leap I think). And Asura warriors have machine guns in their golems. :P
Mobile AoE knockback… I’d use it! Or I’d try it out, at least. Supply Crate is mainly for the daze anyway (and the net turret), so I wouldn’t mind popping mortar just to blast a group apart or off a cliff.
Since you’re already 30 deep in the firearms tree for juggernaut, you’re certainly not hurt by grabbing the +10% rifle damage and -20% rifle cooldown traits on the way. Even if you get the +15% FT damage trait in the alchemy line (possibly on the way to HGH) you still have fairly decent option-build. FT will generally outperform rifle in grouped AOE situations even with rifle’s piercing (FT has a much wider spread), and rifle will thankfully prove efficient on single-target and boss fights where you’re just not probably going to want to stand up in their face. Neither is going to offer amazingly competitive DPS, and that’s a downright pity, but engineers still bring a lot of utility and are surprisingly decent survivors to help the rest of the party, so your slot is by no means wasted (elixir S is my hero, especially when needing to charge into danger to res someone else). You also bring a net immobilize, knockback, fire combo field, and instant blind to the table with rifle/FT.
Additionally you can swap to FT specifically to build up might for a rifle combo, which while incredibly annoying to actually do, it can still boost your strength up a bit. Still, you don’t have to worry about not using FT if you’re on a boss, or not using rifle if powering down mobs.
I would have probably run away in sheer terror…
Though I admit I would have liked to have seen what would have happened had you encountered burning oil as a finale.
@kreese: The answer to that is DR was bottom-barrel originally, as in many suspected them to be the worst Wv3 server of the listing. This attracted players looking to specifically join and help the bottom-rung, which in turn led to both player transfers as well as a revitalization of interest among the playerbase already present on the server. There have been ups and downs, but the DR of the past nine weeks should not be considered the same as the DR from before that, and in the rating system they had a sizeable deficit to make up before ascending.
Meanwhile other servers are encountering the situations leading to diminished interest in Wv3 whereas originally they had a better showing, and this leads them to a poorer showing yet still having amassed a buffer from earlier matches that must be depleted before they fall.
I imagine the purpose is so that one week doesn’t drastically change a server standing (as many things can happen), though I admit to not actually knowing what the ranking system designers really intended. I mean a lot can happen to a server, and active guilds transferring off can completely change its Wv3 showing within moments, but would it be fair to those that remained if it caused an immediate drop in placement without giving time to adjust? Or… have I been in t8 so long that that is completely different from how it is in higher tiers? I joined my brother on DR when I started (he liked the name) and haven’t played on any other, and that’s what it’s at least seemed like to me.
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Just make enemy players all look like generic scarecrow graphics, maybe unique for class. Their appearance already doesn’t matter since they’re all colored generically red anyway.
Well ok, maybe add a “naked scarecrow” option for those running around in their skivvies…
I still ask me how can someone throw a grenade further than a rifle shot xD
It’s because GW2 guns fire pixie dust which dissipate over long distance in the air. Don’t believe me? When was the last time you ever saw anyone reload a rifle in the game? And that doesn’t even cover some of the magical abilities, as let me tell you if someone shot me with a bouncing blob of electricity from a pistol, I’d sure as kitten be confused about it, too!
Why would I sit around on my engi when I can just level my elementalist alt?
Can’t wait to get her to 80!
FT’s #2 is already a low cooldown. Lowering it further and making it a more ranged attack would just lead either to it becoming an auto-attack ability itself (ranged pew pew pew), or another key-mashing spam like grenade #1 was. FT, like the rifle, is intended to get you up close to things (hence flame jet’s poop range and the +200 toughness from juggernaut).
If anything FT #2 should have the explosion size increased, because that’s where the money is. As it stands it’s so tiny and slow that trying to hit a mob with the blast often ends with either it falling short (out of range) or it passing through (minor damage) and the explosion hitting nothing. This is especially true if you’re hitting with flame jet and trying to back out to blast on cooldown (which is ideal for a direct damage FT build… assuming you can hit with it!).
Alternatively make the shot explode on impact instead of at a set distance. I mean no one sane is using the skill for the pathetic ball damage as it passes through things.
It’s a shame that SF who isnt outmanned has to wait and spawn the NPC champion to take towers. It’s even numbers out there late night fellas. .
I don’t get it. Is this really a shame? It’s a new event specifically put into the game to help both organize and inspire weaker sides and honestly I want to see it happen on my side for myself (those NPCs are nuts!).
I don’t want to discount SF and HoD because that first day after reset was incredibly interesting. You had each server immediately take and defend their towers, and everyone was active everywhere; 30-man zergs in what felt like all maps from all three servers. Then the game went down for the Wintersday’s patch (all booted from WvW) and suddenly it felt like everything was smaller. Even on DR the queue times completely dissipated, as the queue for EB and DR bl is what led me into SF’s bl immediately after reset but completely vanished after Wv3 was reopened.
But from what I saw in the bl that first day both SF and HoD have a lot to offer. I won’t forget SF’s attempt to recapture Bay in the borderlands with its speedy and organized placement of balista and catapults to take out all my recently constructed defenses (I did a lot of supply running for those!). They both have used noticeably different tactics from what I’m accustomed to seeing, and I like that. And I hope to see more as the weeks go on and the holidays taper down.
Incidentally am I the only one who wishes they could use all these ugly wool sweaters to make an awesome looking holiday zerg?
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Juggernaut damage will not equal grenade spam even post nerf, but it will be competitive with might build up. Honestly constantly drinking potion buffs isn’t much fun for me, but I must admit Elixir B is quite the varied kittentail of boons. Also note that even if you’re running HGH for 2 stacks of might per elixir drink, throwing them still only gives you 1 stack (booo).
None of this matters for high mobility fights in dungeons, such as Alpha in CoE, where both grenades and FT will miss as often as they hit. In these instances you’re better off using the rifle or pistol, so you don’t really want to neglect them.
For the record, Flame Jet (FT #1) is a melee attack, meaning it can’t be projectile reflected (although the #2 flame blast can, as it’s a projectile). It CAN be reflected as damage if you attack something with retaliation (ie, the Butcher in HotW), but fortunately flame jet’s individual hits are slow and kitten weak, so you have to really work to do serious damage to yourself with it.
DR is stoked for finally moving up a tier. I mean I know I am! I am freaking excited! Also Christmas stuff! Whee!
Likewise, I would expect this week especially to see a very high turnout of DR. I was literally fighting for a place in Wv3 upon reset because after so many weeks of the same something new like this just got me motivated (I had never started EB in the north keep, for instance, as DR had been green since well before Halloween).
The real question I have is whether or not the Wv3 presence will continue into later weeks. It might, and I’m not sure if I hope it will, but I am still curious.
You have to remember just how Kaineng played in WvW. Kain may not have been able to field masses of players all the time, but they were almost always there; someone was taking camps somewhere, and it was a very rare window when Kaineng was completely inactive. This stands in contrast even to FC, who had obvious “dead times” where you could jump between all the maps and hardly even see a single one (a single camp-party at best). It was often these moments that Kain found itself against the direct focus of DR’s attention, and likewise it was Kain’s constant interjection that often pulled DR out of places like FC’s borderlands. It’s no mistake that FC’s bl fell on Wednesday at times when Kaineng’s presence had dropped, nor is it coincidental how previous weekly incursions into FC were diverted and destroyed when Kain took advantage to either retake EB southeast or FC bl’s southern towers (which is actually the sort of stuff that makes Wv3 awesome). You may not have been the largest zerg in the swarm, but you were always there poking, and it was only for the last two weeks when drama-splosions hit you internally that your overall presence was seriously lacking.
My experience with Kain is that they are tenacious kittens that continually stab you when you start looking north, whereas FC would completely pull out and wait for a more vulnerable moment before striking with gusto.
I’ll end this post saying I liked both Kain and FC as opponents and I feel I learned a lot from them (I completely duplicated some of the siege set-up of FC’s bl keeps, as well as organized a very Kaineng-style supply camp defense based off very troublesome encounters with them). That said, I am completely rooting for ET because FC/Kain will always be red jerks to me. <3
The toolbelt exists so that you still have a utility skill when equipping a kit, as well as to give other utility skills an additional use. Basically all our utilities have two different uses to them which makes the slot more valuable, and it’s already pretty unique compared to other professions.
Turrets will always be loved for their blast finishers (who doesn’t like blowing up healing turret in the water field for AOE heal?), as well as some of their quickly recharging toolbelt skills in a static discharge build. Rocket can also be used to take out otherwise inaccessible trebs if you trait to make it green-circle targetted.
They will also be hated for turning around 180 degrees and shooting the skelk that happens to be an inch closer than the player you’re fighting who just did a back roll.
stuff
1. In exchange we can equip and swap kits.
2. Rather than seeing it as “a kit that takes up a utility slot”, you should be seeing it as “a utility skill that maps to an F-key and also equips a faux-secondary weapon”. Kits do no expend a utility slot, as the toolbelt ability can largely be viewed as such.
3. Toolbelt skills vary. For instance rifle toolbelt is a very short cooldown, and both big ol’ bomb and grenade barrage are nothing but awesome. Even some of the more rarely equipped abilities like slick shoe’s speed boost are incredibly potent for their situations which, by and large, puts most toolbelt skills in line with other profession’s utility skills. Granted some ARE terrible (incendiary ammo, thumper’s blast, and ALL of the thrown elixirs with their random kitten effects), but then every profession has abilities resolved to need work so we’re not unusual there.
4. Turret cooldowns aren’t as bad as you think, though some are admittedly in need of addressing. For comparison the elementalist’s glyph of lesser elemental is a 45 second cooldown, which gives a mobile damaging pet. Alternatively rocket turret, our turret with the worst cooldown, has a full 60 second cooldown. This is followed by thumper turret at 50 seconds (which is fair, as thumper is basically an earth elemental that trades mobility for an on-demand knockdown), flame turret (whose best use is the smoke field…) at 40 seconds, then net turret (always fantastic) at 30 seconds, and finally the spammably weak rifle turret at 20 seconds. Given that we can have more than one out at a time and all can be “overcharged” for additional effects or exploded for a blast finisher, they’re easily put on par with elementals despite the trade off against their mobility (though I still find rocket turret’s cooldown to be completely absurd for its utility, and also possibly flame’s).
5. It is not completely unusual for a profession to have one elite that stands out. Also while Supply Crate is king on land, Elixir X is completely viable while underwater. It is true that mortar needs work.
6. They want the engineer to itemize for toughness. This is clear with their “rune of the engineer”, which gives power and toughness. The class is meant to be played running in and out of melee range depending on the fights. Granted some (many) fights make this too dangerous to consider, but then even thieves must sometimes pull out the guns to kite-fight. Kits are ideally supposed to also help with this, giving us additional options up close (FT/bomb/tool) as well as at range (grenade), but they all currently have their own flaws to deal with.
7. None of the engineer’s primary attacks are designed with single-target in mind, but rather small-scale grouped AoE. Rifle #1 pierces and #3 and #5 are both close AoEs, pistol #1 explodes, #2 spreads, and #3 bounces, and the only kit with a single-target attack is the tool kit. This is not to say that our attacks don’t need buffs in damage (warrior melee is a cone-AoE so our piercing is hardly special), but for the most part the only real “single-target” stuff we have is utility abilities like net shot.
8. We have more control options than a thief, and can equip some excellet escape traits and abilities. We have elixir S and can even trait to use it for free at <25% health, and can even trait for free stealth any time we’re immobalized (with a short cooldown). The problem of course being that there’s just never enough room for all the traits we want at one time…
What engineers really need more than anything else is intuitive synergy. An elementalist can drop a fire combo field with off-hand dagger, then use scepter #2 and #3 inside it to AoE buff 6 stacks of might on themselves and the party. To replicate, an engineer must drop a napalm blast with a flamethrower (which has a very narrow field to combo in), then either explode a turret inside it (invalidating the turret) or use either the thumper’s toolbelt ability (assuming it’s equipped) or their supply crate elite. This is just weird, and full of unique downsides involving which skills you bring and how you have to use them. It’s a lot of work for what can be done much easier by someone else.
Then again, that might be part of the charm of the profession? We can do almost everything, but nothing easily? If nothing else blast finishers can always synergize with someone else’s combo field.
tl;dr – Engineers are still interesting but admittedly have flaws that likely need to be looked at.
(edited by LegoTechnic.5910)
1) I cannot have two legendary rifles, no. Not that awesome. Yeah sure it’s completely worthless when using a kit, but you know, I have it! I want to use it! Don’t make me cry! :p
2) I do occasionally go down in dungeons, which makes the stacks generally unappealing to me.
That is an interesting thought, though. I’ll have to think about it.
(edited by LegoTechnic.5910)
To the OP, there were and are a lot of good (PvP) engineers that do not use the grenade build.
Actually I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that good (PvP) engineers don’t use the grenade build. You occasionally see some throwing them at their feet, but they always keep it as utility and vary it up afterwards (alternatively it is more common to see bomb kits being used).
But then grenades were gaining popularity as a PvE build for leveling and dungeons, especially with the vulnerability stacks. They can still be used for vulnerability support, but they’re no longer intrinsicly better than other mediocre builds; I am finding very little difference in performance between grenade-rifle and a much easier to play (but still mediocre performance) might-stacking juggernaut build, which makes me somewhat sad.
For a rifle/juggernaut build, how does sigil of force (+5% damage) compare against sigil of strength (might on crit)? I’m still undecided as to whether or not I want to re-sigil, and am curious about the math.
Two runes of strength (+20% might duration) may or may not be in play. Also, is there any way to prevent a mesmer from stealing might? >_>;
Grenades have always been good for condition builds due to their easy stacks of bleed (shrapnel grenade) and poison (poison grenade), but typically only as a support utility to swap-attack with. You lay on your pistol conditions then swap back-and-forth to grenades when appropriate, then just keep the conditions up (part of this is also due to the pistol’s generally lackluster damage). It’s a very dynamic playstyle when grenades are supportive rather than primary.
At least that’s how I played them. It’s typically hard to get a grenadier trait as well as everything else you want for the condition build unless you specifically trait for grenades, at which point you’d probably just be better off with direct damage anyway, so if I’m condition build I only have 10 points in explosives. There is certainly something to be said about the explosives line’s +30% condition duration, especially on your bleeds, but if you’re partying with other condition classes or dealing with a boss that speed-drops conditions it becomes depreciated in value, especially compared to firearm’s +30% condition damage.
However if you’re ok with being a vulnerability stacker in between shrapnel and poison applications (and frost/blind), then grenades will always be your cup of tea.
I liked the second skill of FT, if only it isn’t that glitchy…
I really, REALLY like flame blast with a crit-damage build because that explosion hits hard and it’s on a reasonably fast cooldown, but the range restriction is difficult and it really just doesn’t synergize with flame jet in general. You need to be almost a full roll back from maximum flame jet range, but not actually that far for it to hit, and if you’re too close it hits weak (just the ball damage as it goes through) and too far it’s Out of Range lost.
It also has a terrible tendency to launch off in a crazy direction if the mob is moving because the auto-targetting attempts to lead the target but the ability is so much slower than the target’s ability to change direction (thus the shot goes off into useless space). This latter issue likely can’t be fixed, ever, due to ranged game mechanics, but it could certainly use some speeding up so isn’t so embarrassingly silly looking.
But when flame blast hits for crit damage with a damage build? That’s <3, there. I’ll take my 4k, thank you.
I figure it’s time to give grenades a rest so I’m trying the flamethrower/might idea, though I’m using sigil of force on a rifle instead of sigil of strength. Took the damage increases to both rifle and FT (because you can’t always use FT safely), as well as juggernaut and HGH for obvious reasons, and running with Elixir S (for safety) and either Elixir B or Elixir R. I know I could get a few more additional stacks of might from dropping S and running B and R, as well as taking sigil of strength, but honestly it all feels like a huge pain in the kitten so I’d rather just keep things manageable.
Honestly the build is fun, and a lot easier to play than grenades (and I mean holy kittening hell night and day difference), and I also appreciate not having to jackhammer the 1 key while dodging around while trying to aim during CoE’s Alpha fight (which admittedly was super fun and challenging). I will probably stick with it for a while, otherwise I might go back to full support build and try to turret blast my way to healer status or something, though honestly I don’t much enjoy that.
The 200 toughness from juggernaut is very noticeable, though.