Well, now that I have had time to collect my thoughts, I’ve got feedback on the Holosmith. For reference, Engineer is one of my two most played classes, and I primarily play PvE content. Sorry in advance for the well more than 100 word wall of text.
First off, Holomsith really doesn’t feel like an Engineer at all. It really feels like some other class poorly stapled onto Engineer. Part of this is because the traitline is exclusively about the new Forge, offering next to no synergy with other traitlines (there’s the Explosive skill fact on some things, and that’s basically it). The fact that Forge is so powerful and locks out kits, also tries to discourage usage of kits, which further distances it from core Engineer. And then the sword and Exceeds scale off of heat, so it receives more benefit from those skills compared to those available to base Engineer. On top of that, it loses the thing that really makes Engineer play distinct from other classes: no cooldown on kit swaps or limited time in a kit/shroud/transformation. Forge locks you out of your weapon and kits for 6 seconds, heat softlocks you out of Forge, and the heat scaling on sword/Exceeds discourages using those skill if you’re over the threshold.
Furthermore, and most importantly, it doesn’t actually add anything new to Engineer. Holosmith isn’t bringing anything besides moar dps, and dps is one area in which Engineer wasn’t lacking. Photon Forge is essentially just a super-kit, not a really new or interesting thing. The kit lockout won’t stop the meta Engineer build in raids or fractals from using kits— either kits will fill the time while Forge is cooling off, or Forge will fill the time you’re waiting for kit cooldowns. Even in casual play, it doesn’t offer some new kitless Engineer build— that could already be done, and Scrapper was good for that already. And, as mentioned, Forge is like a kit, so it doesn’t even feel like a kitless build.
TL;DR: Holosmith feels like it’s intentionally tossing out part of the Engineer’s identity for bigger numbers. It’s one dimensional, and that dimension was an area where Engineer already excelled. Elite specializations were advertised as allowing classes to fill new roles, and, at least in PvE, Holosmith fails miserably on that front.
I understand that my problems with Holosmith are with the basic design premises of the spec; you can’t even begin address them without going back to square one and creating something completely new. So, in lieu of asking for changes, I ask this: please try to make Engineer’s third elite specialization something that feels more true to core Engineer , and have said elite specialization open up a new role for the class.