Showing Posts For Mathrin.3590:
I’d suggest picking a kit and trait for it and just play for a bit until you get used to what the engineer does. Jumping into a build right away probably isn’t the best in my opinion since we play so much different than other classes.
I’m on DragonBrand so I have a decent chance of facing you in WvW.
If somebody wants to send me what the “standard” build is for the bunker condition engineer, I’ll put it together and work on getting accustomed to the play of it.
Let me know if that is reasonable to you.
I’m looking for a change of pace with my engineer. Still playing mine since day one of release and never get tired of him. Leveled every class to 80 and still say engineers are where it’s at.
That bring said, I want to be as effective as I can in dungeons and fractals. Right now when I jump into PvP I’m on my thief, WvW and it’s the elementalist and dungeons seems to be either my warrior or guardian. Now I’ve spent the most amount of time in fractals with my engineer but I don’t seem to as effective at 15+ as I would like with my engineer.
So what do you all run? Nades? SD? Healing bombs?
Basically I’m open to anything. Let’s hear it.
That’s what that is?!? Man, description should mention mini game or something. I had no clue what I was supposed to do.
Daily Achievement and the description is dead on worthless.
What the hell is this? And how do you do it?
I only use a longbow one of my warriors. But she is a key farming toon, so I guess that doesn’t really help.
My other warrior is GS/AxeAxe. I drank the kool aid and it was good.
Healing Surge followed up with a burst skill removes 3 conditions, so I would say Healing Surge wins in the healing department.
Personally,
Drop Healing Signet for Healing Surge.
You get more health on a pop and when you follow up with your burst skill, you remove 3 conditions since it refills your adrenaline bar.
Drop Dolyak Signet for Balanced Stance
You can use it more often (three times for ever 2 activations of Dolyak Signet) and you trade off damage reduction for swiftness. I’d guess you can reduce more damage staying out of combat than reducing what you are taking when it really comes down to it. Plus, more stability means being less controlled and therefore less of a butt whooping.
For Great Justice over Fear Me
I just like it better, but just a personal preference of damage over control.
Shrug It Off over Vigorous Shouts.
Your healing power is pretty non-existant so your shouts aren’t going to heal for much of anything. Better to lose a condition that will end up doing more damage to you than what your shouts would heal for anyway.
Inspiring Shouts over Warrior’s Sprint
With Balanced Stance, you have movement and Inspiring Shouts works with your shouts to power up your heal and condition removal with burst skills.
I would think that this would get your closer to unkillable since you will have a lot more condition removal (remember, conditions ignore armor and toughness) but I think in the end, you may find yourself having a hard time killing others even though they cant’ kill you. Hold out until support gets there would be the plan I would assume.
(edited by Mathrin.3590)
I agree, I haven’t found a helm I like yet. I usually just keep the helm toggled off. My normal noggin looks better than any helm out there.
I like my engineer backpacks. Maybe I’m a hobo at heart.
Awesome to see some feedback on the build.
Beware! Rocket Boots is not a stun breaker
Also I would take protection injection instead since you won’t get much condi dmg bonus from Blood InjectionYou can be more survivable if you swap power shoes for reinforced shield (faster cooldown on shield, bonus toughness for energized armor) and deadly mixture for backpack regenerator (regen when you hav the kit on)
You are correct in that Rocket Boots are not a true stun breaker, but it does remove our limitations to most movement issues. If you are truly stunned, the elixir gun tool belt skill is a stun breaker. Thanks for clearing that up.
Also, after messing with the numbers some, I would have to agree that Protection Injection will be more beneficial than Blood Injection especially given relatively short cool down of the Protection Injection trait.
I was under the impression that Reinforced Shield didn’t work when you had a kit equipped. If that is not the case, then I would think this is probably the better choice. More damage with a weapon that is notorious for being a weak damage dealer is good.
Follow up to that is the same reason why I would still take the Deadly Mixture over Backpack Regenerator. With 4 abilities that grant regeneration, we will be able to keep group regeneration up pretty much 100%. Thus, making Backpack Regenerator less useful.
…Slick Shoes over Rocket Boots, but I’m intrigued by the added maneuverability and will definitely try it out next time I’m out in the field.
Movement and blast finishers are the goal with the Rocket Boots. If you are in a group in which they are not putting out very many fields that you can blast away in, then Slick Shoes is an absolutely good alternative. Utility skills should never be hard and fast rules.
I’m not a fan of Thumper Turret…I prefer Throw Mine.
I think Throw Mine is a great alternative to Thumper Turret. I prefer the quick F1,F2 for a group heal and regen without the extra hassle of target, toss, detonate to get the same effect. Also, having the stability is just too useful a lot of the time. That being said, if you needed the knock back then Throw Mine is a good replacement. I’d have to chalk this one up to personal preference.
Elixir Gun direct damage is minimal. Thus Deadly Mixture is quite useless trait (and any other similar), it does not affect conditions.
How to do respectable 1v1 damage with Elixir gun based setup you need decent crit chance + sharpshooter (+ sigil of earth) procs. And Incendiary Powder. Easily gets 10+ bleeds and the burning rolling.
Correct in that Deadly Mixture does not effect condition damage, but we also don’t bother putting any points into condition damage either. It is a useless damage trait in this build because you will do more damage maximizing power than putting points into condition damage. Bleeding and Burning are two of the most used conditions in groups with Bleeding easily maxing out on any mob that takes more than a few seconds to kill. Putting any emphasis on this would only reduce our damage output, not increase it. Add in the fact that guardians and elementalists do a lot of fire damage, what little we would add to the queue would ultimately be better served by letting other classes have those slots. Instead, we want to focus our conditions on weakness, cripple, poison and vulnerability.
Working with the calculator on gw2buildcraft.com, no set of armor that gives healing power deals more damage. Of the ones that grant precision or critical damage increase, only Berserker is noticeably higher damage output and even that one, you are giving up 2000 effective health, 5% damage reduction and 300 healing power.
That isn’t to say that a mix of armor might not be the way to go, Knight armor gives a slightly better stat to effective power, effective health and same damage reduction at a cost to healing power. So how much healing power is enough? I don’t have an answer for that yet.
I’ll try to keep replying to people as I can. There are a lot of smarter people than me on these boards and hopefully somebody who is and has a good damage and healing calculator can chime in. I haven’t found a good one that covers all the skills I care about. Would love to find the sweet spot for power, survival and healing/group support.
As always, argue with me and prove me wrong. We will only end up with a better Elixir Gun build because of it.
Traits
Firearms 25
Major
I – Fireforge Trigger
All of Elixir Gun skills are useful, so we want to be able to use them as much as possible.
IV – Rifled Barrels
We don’t really want to be in the middle of the action, but where we are needed to support our team. That being said, we want to make sure we will always be able to hit our target. This allows us to do that.
Minor
Sharpshooter
Pretty irrelevant as Tranquilizer Dart already gives bleeding
Target the Weak
Chance to do more damage? Sure I’ll take it, but not going to count on it.
Target the Maimed
This is more like it. 5% extra damage to bleeding foes and our foes are always bleeding.
Inventions 25
Major
V – Energized Armor
Maxing power by maxing survival. Gaining an additional 93 power from this trait before food.
VIII – Power Shoes
Being able to move around in combat quickly is important for us. Probably won’t noticed a change in speed inside to outside combat which is good. Means we aren’t getting slowed down to combat speed.
Minor
Low Health Response System
Another regeneration. Best not to need this but could come in handy.
Automated Medical Response
Healing skill reset. Good timing, but we shouldn’t be near 25% health.
Performance Enhancement
Yes, please and thank you. 10% of healing power is huge for this build. Boosts power by an additional 138 points before sigils or food is taken into consideration.
Alchemy 20
Major
V – Blood Injection
A minor boost to condition damage since that is one of the major vehicles of damage for us. Easily swap with Protection Injection if you expect to be held a lot.
VII – Deadly Mixture
15% extra damage with the Elixir Gun. No brainer.
Minor
Hidden Flask
Might, Fury, Retaliation and Swiftness all because I got hit a couple of times? This is actually a minor trait we could abuse since we should be able to move over and under 75% pretty easily. Not sure what the cool down is on this one is though.
Transmute
8% chance to change an incoming condition into a boon. Nice when it happens, but sure as hell don’t bank on it.
There you have it. Give your thoughts below on how I could improve and why. All responses without explanation or justification of advice would be ignored.
I was getting bored with my flamethrower build and I started working on using the elixir gun as my primary weapon because why not?
So, you can’t really get away from the support aspect of the weapon, but I want to be able to use it for more than vulnerability and heal/condition removal. So here is where I am going with it. Feel free to tear it all apart and tell me why it sucks and I’m a n00b.
Summary
Maximize Toughness, Healing Power and Power for survivability, group healing and damage output. Take advantage of Energized Armor and Performance Enhancement for extra power. Maximize regeneration abilities and blast heals for group survival.
Weapons
Cleric Pistol with Superior Sigil of Restoration
With the exception of tossing out Static Shot, pretty much here to have a sigil on it.
Cleric Shield with Superior Sigil of Life
Main use will be for the blast finisher and push back. Highly useful when up against a lot of ranged mobs.
Armor
Cleric Armor with 3x Superior Rune of Dwayna and 3x Superior Rune of Water
Between the two rune sets, I will have an increased regeneration duration of 35% along with 150 more healing power. Thanks to Performance Enhancement, that also gives me 15 more power. The 15% extra boon duration on everything else is bonus.
Jewelry
Cleric Amulet, Earrings and Ring with Exquisite Sapphire Jewels
Soldier Back Piece with Exquisite Sapphire Jewel
More Power, Toughness and Healing Power. No surprises here.
Utility Skills
Healing Turret
Chosen for the abundance of regeneration abilities. Three different regeneration granted from it. Tool belt, deployment and over charge.
Tool belt and over charge also give me the water fields I need for the blast group healing. Speaking of blast finishers, you can also detonate it to have it group heal off its own water field.
Typical use would be to drop it and pick it back up for the quick heal and regeneration.
Thumper Turret
Tool belt ability for stability is awesome. Other than the elixir elite skill, it is our only other reliable stability. Add in the fact that is also a blast finisher makes this a great follow up to the healing turret tool belt skill.
Deployed, it gives decent damage but can also be over charged for another blast finisher. Tie this with the healing turret, you can drop Thumper Turret and Healing Turret down together, over charge the healing turret, then the thumper turret for group heal, follow up with detonate thumper turret then healing turret for two more group heals. If done quickly enough, you should be able to get off 3 consecutive group heals with the two turrets (4 if you follow up with tool belt abilities).
Generally speaking, this is mostly used for the tool belt, but options are nice.
Rocket Boots
The tool belt ability is nice for the burn condition, but the primary use is for the stun breaker or blast finisher if one of our others are on cool down. Don’t be afraid to use this to get out of combat or move through combat.
Elixir Gun
Bread and Butter of the build. Our primary blast finisher is here with Acid Bomb. You want to make sure you are getting Fumigate on everything that you can and get the hell out of dodge. Made easier with Acid Bomb and Rocket Boots. Use Elixir F when you can as it makes the front line guys better able to get out of combat when they need to. You do want to be a bit stingy with Super Elixir as this is our primary condition removal with Healing Turret over charge for back up. We can easy spread around the regeneration with the Elixir Gun tool belt ability (and all Healing Turret abilities).
Supply Crate
Best of the engineer elites. Add in the fact that is also a blast finisher means you want to time this so you can make the most of that.
You ignore them because he is playing a PVE engineer. Or did you miss the part where he mentioned ascended gear?
Did u miss the part where u can wear ascended in WVW?
Yes I did!
Actually didn’t even think about it since no one class/build is so powerful in WvW you need to worry about it.
Personally, I rarely come across them unless I’m free roaming and even then rarely.
Because Flame Jet. 10 hits in 2 seconds. Faster than anything else in the game.
You ignore them because he is playing a PVE engineer. Or did you miss the part where he mentioned ascended gear?
Engineers with movement issues? Laughable.
Speedy Kits is the obvious answer (just look at all the times it is mentioned above).
Can’t seem to get the timing down? Use runes to increase duration.
Oh, don’t want to waste runes huh? I understand. Funny thing is that the med kit has a stimulant that grants speed and is a kit. Amazing!
But my trait points are precious! you say. Very well, Met Kit + Elixer B = kitten near 100% uptime. Such a shame you have to have all that extra might and precision to go with it.
But I want to go Faster! 33% movement speed is not enough! I don’t care if it is 8% faster than classes with sigils!
Fair enough, add in some Rocket Boots for fling you forward.
No! FASTER!
Fine, add in Elixir Gun (hey, look at that, another kit) and 180 around before you Acid Bomb for another super blast ahead.
YOU DON’T GET IT!! I MUST MOVE LIKE THE FLASH!!!!!
Speedy Kits, Med Kit Stimulant, Elixir B, Elixir Gun for permanent 33% increased movement speed, Rocket Boots to shoot forward, Acid Bomb to shoot forward some more and Rifle to keep the boosts going.
So much movement, that even Warriors will be jealous of you.
I think flamethrower 2 should give a 2 second burn condition when it explodes and remove the burn bullets from the toolbelt and replace it with a fireblast at current location that is a blast finisher with a 25-30 second cooldown.
And if you are really hard up on blast finishers, then you could use the thumper turret which has 3 for one utility skill.
Honestly, I wouldn’t even bother with condition damage on the flamethrower build. You only get the burning condition on the last hit on flame jet and it barely last long enough for you to get in a couple hits of the next channel even with extending condition durations.
You’d be better off getting more criticals and doing damage that way. Either my way with a 80%+ crit chance, or less but more crit damage like Langiest posted.
Yeah, that is using the old trait system.
I haven’t tested a version I have been theory crafting, but you are welcome to give it a go if you like.
Goal is to maximize Power, Toughness and Critical Chance.
Uses all Knight gear with Fighter and Mesmer runes.
Traits are to increase damage output:
Firearms (30 points for more crit chance)
I – Fireforge Trigger for more flamethrower ability usage.
V – Precise Sights for increased vulnerability stacking. Good with the high crit chance and improved damage
VIII – Juggernaught for more toughness (and thus more power) and might stacks for more power.
Inventions (20 points for more toughness/power)
V – Energized Armor for making all that toughness give you more power.
VII – Power Shoes to keep you on the move. Bob and weave.
Alchemy (20 points for more vitality and boon duration, nice touch)
VI – Protection Injection is best of the bunch, but also really useful to keep you taking as much of a beating when you are trapped.
VII – Deadly Mixture for power damage. MOAR!
Minors of note:
Sharpshooter – Bleeds on crits
Target the Maimed – Increased damage on bleeders
Target the Weak – More crit on anything under 50% health
Hidden Flask – Elixer B when you hit 75% health. More power and crit chance for free.
Weapons:
I usually go with Pistol/Shield. Pick your poison, I like shield for the blast finisher, pushback and interupt. Stuck with the pistol at this point, but pistol 3 is useful for the stun.
Sigils of Perception and Accuracy for improved crit chance.
You should be using Flamethrower pretty much 100% of the time to keep might stacks up.
Utility skills:
Elixer H – Gives the most bang for the buck, but healing turret wouldn’t be bad if you are running in a group for the blast healing. No real healing power, but effect would be minimal.
Thumper Turret – Probably won’t be putting this out that often unless you need to push back or blast finisher, toolbelt skill gives stability which is a hard to find skill on engineers that want to be in your face.
Elixir Gun – Pick your poison on this one:
tool belt regeneration whenever it is off cool down
condition removal and heal, plus light field to combo with pistol for more condition removal
fumigate for vulnerability
And, flamethrower. Obviously. Just don’t forget about the toolbelt skill as it causes burning which is good for more damage.
Elite: Supply Crate is the only good engineer one, but there are some good racial elites out there as well. I like Defense Golem on asurans personally.
General playstyle would be to stay in the flamethrower to keep might stacks up, swap to elixir gun for fumigate vulnerability, then right back to flamethrower to stack on the damage. Liberal use of the flamethrower 2 skill. Use smokescreen and push wisely. Don’t forget that firewall is a might blast finisher. You have 5 blast finishers (shield 4, elite, elixir gun 4, thumper turret overcharge and toolbelt)
Hopefully that works for you. Should have a good bit of damage and survivability.
Messing around with the build calculators and wanted to get some input on a Flamethrower build. I know they aren’t supposed to the be the most uber of things uber but I enjoy playing one.
It is a pistol shield combo with flamethrower and elixers.
All weapons and armor are Carrion stats.
Pistol with Sigil of Smoldering
Shield with Sigil of Battle
Armor with full set of Engineer Runes
Trinkets are all Apothecary with Passion Flower (or Ascended Apothecary)
Back is Soldier with Passion Flower (or Ascended Soldier)
Skills are Elixers H, B and R along with Flamethrower.
Elite is typically Defense Golem as I’m Asuran
Traits:
20 Explosives: Exploit Weakness (Empowering Adrenaline?) and Enhance Performance
20 Firearms: Flameforged Trigger and Juggernaught
30 Alchemy: Fast Acting Elixer, Cleansing Formula 409 and HGH
The idea is to take advantage the might stacks of Juggernaught and HGH (I can reliably reach 22-24 stacks of might and 25 if I really wanted it). I shouldn’t need a dedicated stun breaker or condition removal with 409 since I’m going to want to be spaming my elixers anyway for the might. Having shield is nice for the Blast Finisher and Stun/Daze.
I wanted to maximize my condition damage while also upping my survivability with plenty of toughness/vitality and making the most of my regeneration boons with healing power.
Let me know what you all think.
Also, for what it’s worth: Underwater is grenades with Carrion Harpoon Gun with Sigil of Force and Supply Crate.
Woot! Just picked up 500 Obsidian Shards. Thanks Tarnished Coast!!
Need a US server as well.
I’ve been running a dagger pistol build around blind, healing power and precision. Use blood sigils, power precision weapons and Armor with healing runes. My jewelry us all vitality toughness. Seems to be working for me. I’ve only gotten to level 40 though.
shrug
I’d love to join you all sometime as well.