Guild Wars 2

GK, where are you ranking Grenade Engi’s now? IIRC they were coming in last on your DPS spread sheet. Have they jumped up a bunch or what?

For leveling most kits are fine. Flame Thrower and Elixir Gun are both a bit lower damage but still effective. Don’t use Grenades until you hit 60 and take the Grenadier trait. Rifle with Bomb Kit and Tool Kit are both good.

I struggled a bit until I started using Rifle/Static Discharge, after that the burst was just really nice to level with. TK is nice here with its block, pull and cripple. Bombs are setup great, if you kite most things the bomb explodes right under the mob while running. You’ll want to get to know all kits though so experiment.

Power builds work well with everything but Pistol/Pistol and Elixir Gun (excluding EG4 which hits like a truck)

Rampager builds work well with P/P, Grenades, Bombs and Elixir Gun.

Condition you want to work with P/P, Grenades and EG.

At 80, if I’m setup for bombs or grenades I’ll usually run Pistol/Shield because you get two sigils that stay in effect when you’re in a kit, vs one with Rifle. But your damage is coming from the kit not the weapon. There are variants that benefit a lot from Rifle though, like if you’re using Sitting Duck trait.

If you run Rifle try Static Discharge/Speedy Kits traits. SD is a nice boost to damage output for Rifle and you can switch the trait to Speedy Kits for travel.

You’ll want short Toolbelt cooldowns for your skills, I suggest Rifle Turret, Tool Kit and Personal Battering Ram or Rocket Boots.

Bomb Kit is nice to level with also, I’d still suggest using the same setup but running BK instead of Tool Kit.

GL
Blood~

Not quite sure what’s going on here. Has anything changed since the claim of Engi 9K max DPS compared with Elementalists 16K? Why would you ask for a nerf?

If anything I would expect a ‘Buff Engineer’ request.

Depending on group makeup Grenades brings so much to the table that it is hard not to run it and DPS wise is one of our top options. Modified Ammo was a great step towards helping Engi but Grenades gets the most benefit which just makes it even harder to run something different. Bombs scale quite well and are a good option if others in the group are supplying Vulnerability.

We need a buff to everything else before a nerf to Grenades.

Blood~

I run Force on my Ascended weapons. I figure it works all the time and Ascended+Force is the same as Exotic + Night (unless there’s some different maths happening…)

On Exotics I’ll have one of each and will try to stack um when I can.

Blood~

I ran something similar to Seras post. Med Kit, Rifle Turret, Tool Kit and Personal Battering Ram. Lets you control your opponent by knocking them around a bunch while you throw out your damage. I usually go for Rifle Mod other then Sitting Duck because you have a bunch of control to start with.

IMHO

Blood~

I’ve always liked Rifle/TK 0/30/0/10/30. It runs SD but I’d consider it more a damage supplement then a burst build depending on your skills.

Without SD Rifle isn’t real good as a stand alone main weapon. We need our kits n tricks.

Med Kit, Tool Kit, Rifle Turret and one other skill are what I’d suggest. Tool Kit has great utility with a block and pull.

Rocket Boots, Net Turret, Elixir Gun, Slick Shoes, or Personal Battering Ram are what I’d suggest for the skill.

GL
Blood~

Think Edgar had some good ideas.

Chainsaw, Drill, Noise Blaster, Auto Crossbow, Flash Kit..

We already have the Bio Blaster.

Would like a melee kit, although Tool Kit isn’t too bad for damage.

Improve FT Autoattack damgage while their at it.

Blood~

Here is a fun build I play once in a while.

0/30/0/20/20

You’re switching stuff around a lot but the nice part is you can stack might.

FT4 fire field, Blast finish it with the two turret Detonates, Shield4 and EG4. This will give the group 12 stacks of might which you should be able to maintain. Get our pugs to blast your firefield also.

For damage FT2, EG4, Rifle3, Rifle5 and Surprise Shot toolbelt. FT auto is nice for stacking some Vulnerability.

Not the highest DPS but you’ll add to the group. Not to mention all the utility of EG and FT. If you get other blasters in your group use Rifle Turret to add Vulnerability instead of blasting it for might. You’ll also stack might while in FT with Juggernaut.

GL n have fun,

Blood~

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

You only need to maintain one to stay competitive with most low-tier DPS classes, i.e. ranger/engineer/necro/warrior. It’s only when you’re going up against elementalists and thieves that you need to be on top of your game to compete.

With a 10/20/0/25/15 Sw/S Sw/F and 3x phantasms on the field I can’t quite match a new 30/30/0/0/10 Bomb Engi.

30/30/0/0/10 Mantra/Phantasm can match with 2x phantasms. But this build lacks reflects.

These comparisons come from my personal solo in game testing on Mists Golem and Vet Giants. Not sure how they scale with group buffs n such.

I have however been able to maintain 2x Phantasms a majority of the time through dungeons with 10/20/0/25/15 and SotE. I would say that this is a completely viable zerker build for dungeons.

IMHO
Blood~

Guard’s crit damage boosts are in the toughness tree, not ideal either. I’d love to have crit dmg in Firearms but its workable without IMHO. Had some great runs with 10/30/0/0/30 Rifle/SD burst but I don’t run much PvP lately. I actually like it this way, promotes build diversity.

Blood~

Sounds like people are trying to justify their loss or taking their ‘anger’ out on you instead of ANet. We are given tools, it would be stupid not to use them. Mesmers need phantasms n clones, our personal DPS is horrible with out them. You are not personally responsible for an unbalanced game.

If ANet deems a build OP they will fix it, until then use it and abuse it, IMHO.

In game 30/30/0/0/10 Mantra/Phantasm has given me the best numbers but you lose out on Focus reflects. 10/20/0/25/15 is a nice build but it’s lower DPS. Phantasm DPS is great but you need to maintain at least 2x to keep stay competitive with other DPS’rs and sometimes its hard to do so, I’ve been running other classes lately because they tend to be more consistent although I haven’t given SotE a fair shot yet. Shatter has pretty low sustained DPS but nice burst and AoE. Both these builds are completely viable with full Zerker.

Blood~

zaragoz.6351:

Needless to say I really want to play power, but I just seem to do so much better when running conditions.

I’ve done a lot of in game comparative testing between builds, looking to find our highest sustained DPS PvE wise. In my test scenario’s Power almost always beats out Condition builds for DPS. Zerker and Rampagers are on about the same level, but with the crappy condition mechanics your dps can be lost by overwritten bleeds or pushed back burning.. I’ve found Power DPS to be much more reliable and in almost all cases higher then Condi. Also, I believe Power scales better with Vulnerability and Might, could be wrong here though.

Melee builds are almost always higher damage then ranged across all classes, risk vs reward. At least from what I’ve tested.

Where Engi’s are concerned Power Grenades with the new Modified Ammo is doing really well as a ranged option. Rifle/SD is pretty solid if you’re in a group that supplies Vulnerability and Conditions, but Rifle should be considered a melee or short range weapon. FT2, EG4 and Bomb Kit scale quite well with Power but I would not consider these ranged.

Blood~

I would like to see a more consistent DPS model. We’re either doing great damage with 3x phantasms or low DPS with no phantasms or Shatter. I’d like even a single Phantasm ‘Pet’ that’s not reliant on a target to stay on the board. I’d also like to see Shatter at a competitive sustained DPS level.

Blood~

My dream is to one day patch up to a 15% autoattack damage increase and blast finisher on Flame Blast.

Stop teasing us ANet, FT is the coolest weapon in the game, please kick it up a bit…

Blood~

P.S. I would like a Chainsaw Kit to go with this. You gave us zombies, we need the proper tools to combat this…

The big problem I see with Engi is the player skill vs reward. To squeeze out the most DPS you need to flip kits constantly and try to watch cooldowns. And when you get good at it you’re only on par with other classes dps builds, but it still requires a ton of micro management. This class should at least reward a skilled player with higher DPS IMHO. I finally hit 80 on my warrior(after a year of procrastinating) and man, pushing dps with that class is like reclining on the beach sipping lemonade compared to Engi, still like Engi better though

I personally like the single weapon and kit setup. The almost 0 swap cooldown makes the class feel unique.

I agree we do need some tuning and fixes.

1. Phantasms cooldown on PvE trash. Gimme 1 phantasm that doesn’t die when your target dies… or something..

2. Lack of a power based 1h ranged weapon that doesn’t eat Phantasms with auto attacks.

Bombs,

I ran a 30/10/0/0/30 build for quite a while and it felt pretty good. Great in large zerg and 5+ man teams. Lots of mobility for traveling, not a lot of HP regen but the Healing Turret and 3x blasts work nicely. I also ran this with OH Pistol for better burning sometimes. Currently I have Perplexity but not a lot of Interrupts so I think Undead could be another cheaper option. I’ve moved to Rampagers now but Rabid is really good also. Throw in Bombs in place of Slick Shoes if you get zerg vs zerg play. Not sure if this is what you’re looking for but I had a lot of fun with it.

One of my favorite things is Super Speed>Slick Shoes>Rocket Boots, you can cut a moving zerg in half with it

Blood~

I’ve been running this build since before the patch but I was mostly Grenadier with bomb kit available for fields. I decided to drop grenades and rely on bombs/rifle last night. With the larger area bomb blasts this build is really fun and effective.

Blood~

Phineas Poe.3018:

How did you feel the damage was compared to Scholar? I was thinking about posting it as an alternate, but with so many LH Eles out there, I want to make sure that players are getting the most bang for their buck (and not getting stacks overwritten).

Hoelbrak/Fire/Strength is a significantly cheaper alternative, too.

On a personal level its hard to move away from scholar but very few pugs do any might/vulnerability stacking so I feel it does speed things up. It can be a real help to the party but it can also be rendered useless if people are throwing random fields. Communication is important especially in pugs. I love hammer guards except in this situation…

Blood~

I’ve seen some pistol only builds that were pretty effective in wvw but the fights are slow and I cant recall exactly what it was.

If this is for PvE I’d suggest a build like this 30/30/0/10/0. Good damage and It stacks Might and Vulnerability quite well for improved group damage. I can easily maintain 12 stacks of might and 18 stacks of vulnerability. The fire field/blast setup takes a little practice but its not hard when you get the hang of it. 6x blasts and and Water or Smoke fields are available also. Its flexible to optimize bombs or grenades. Pistol isn’t used much but Shield’s blast is needed.

I’m not aware of any really strong pistol only builds for PvE, DPS wise.

Blood~

Nice, I forgot to change the food to 20% boon duration for 90% might duration. It does seem to make dungeons run faster and easier.

I wish they’d change how conditions work. I hate seeing my bleeds fall off or my burning stop ticking because someone else has a higher burn on…

Blood~

Best numbers I’ve gotten since patch have been with either Zerker or Rampager’s 30/30/0/0/10, they seem to come out the same in solo testing. Zerker would probably come out slightly ahead in PvE depending on group makeup.

The link is what I run personally. P/P would be good with Rampagers for more Burning but I don’t have ascended pistols yet so I use rifle.

Stack up vulnerability and go to town, Net Shot and Glue Bomb both work here. Keep as many different conditions on the target as you can for more Modified Ammo.

Hair Trigger can be substituted for Sitting Duck if you easily maintain high stacks of Vulnerability.

If I pug I’ll run a Might/Vulnerability stacking build. Drops your personal DPS down but increases overall DPS. 30/30/0/10/0 Fire Fields and 4 to 6 blasts depending on how you wanna run it.

Blood~

Rifle would probably be Zerker in PvE and Zerker/Knights/PVT in WvW depending on your play style.

Blood~

I ran with a pretty static guild group for quite a while. A lot of them started with mixed or defensive stats. A lot of the content was pretty challenging. Then most moved closer to zerker and polished builds with DPS in mind. A lot of content then was much less challenging and a lot more fun. Some of the hardest dungeons I’ve run was with a ‘tank’ warrior and a ‘healer’ guard, terribly slow and a number of wipes.

I’d never kick anyone for running a build they like, Zerker just seems a lot more fun and easier IMHO.

Blood~

30/30/0/0/10 Grenades/Modified Ammo got a nice boost this patch. From my testing Zerker and Rampager DPS is about equal. In PvE you’ll prolly be ahead with Zerker gear just cuz the mechanics of conditions. I run half Rampagers half Zerker for fun.

Rabid would be lower.

Blood~

eleshazar.6902:

If you guys do the math, scepter/torch actually has higher dps than any other weapon combo on guard (on par with GS). Focus isn’t a dps weapon, it is a defensive weapon.

Scepter 2 and torch 5 deal a ridiculous amount of damage with low cooldowns. They offer the best dps for a guard. I’ve never understood why people seem to think sword is better dps when the research is out there showing that this isn’t the case….. (Actually it is because a lot of people are comparing auto-attacks, which of course scepter falls into the second to last lowest for guardian on the auto-attack chain, but if you take into account the other skills is quickly rises to seconds best. And best when you add torch offhand.)

http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/70080-guardian-effective-dps-tests/

Scepter is great but its situational. Projectiles don’t pierce and Smite is stationary, as others have said. 90% of the time I run scepter as a ranged option.

Torch is also situational. If you need burning its a solid choice. T4 is a DPS increase if you crit. T5 is not very good compared to Sword AA, it has a terribly long cast time. I would only use it if I have multiple targets to hit. I cringe when I see guards T5 single targets… If you don’t need Burning, Focus will come out ahead in DPS, 4 is a Blind/Vulnerability if traited and 5 is an instant cast w/blast.

Hammer is, again, situational. With the right build hammer can be competitive DPS with a recent improvement to WoP. If you’re in an organized Fire Field Blasting group it will really mess things up and people will get angry Sword and Scepter are preferred in these situations as they don’t drop fields to cover fire fields. In a pug or non-blasting group Hammer is a solid choice.

Don’t take my word for it though, go to the mists and time some stuff. Comparisons are easily had.

Blood~

From what I’ve tested a 30/30/0/0/10 build (like what Jerem posted) with 3x Mantras and 3x Phantasms sustains some very impressive damage, ranking near the top. Fire Staff elementalists with the right build can sustain a bit higher DPS and can burst higher with summoned elementals. These are both situational though and not fully sustainable in most situations. Again, what I’ve seen from my personal solo testing, could be different in group settings.

Blood~

I’m not a fan of totally relying on conditions in PvE. They can get pushed back or fall of the stack and become useless. I’ve been playing with a build that is support/dps and it’s proving to be fun and quite helpful to the group. Its not tanky but you may wanna try it in PvE.

30/30/0/10/0 Pistol/Shield // Healing Turret/Rifle Turret/Bomb Kit and Grenade Kit. Rampagers gear with 2x Runes of Strength, Fire and Hoelbrak for Might duration.

This gives you a fire field, water field and smoke field for blasting in. Every 30 seconds you can blast 4 times in any of these fields for group healing, might or stealth. I can maintain 12 Might and ~18 Vulnerability on the target which is very nice. If your group cooperates its a great support build, especially if others blast in your fields. It also does good damage and from what I’ve seen lately a condition player in PvE is sorta rare so condition damage can be more viable.

GL out there,

Blood~

I carry a full set of zerker armor, weaps n trinkets and a set of soldiers armor. I usually run in mostly zerker but I’ll switch out once in a while.

I’d suggest gearing to where you’re comfortable, maybe knights/soldiers armor and zerker trinkets n weapons. When that gets comfortable start switching armor into zerker. I know you wanted a tanky/support build so I left the Soldier Runes there which you can switch out at some point also. Maybe a set of Knights/Soldiers armor with Soldier runes and a second set of Zerker with Ruby Orbs or something. Most importantly play to a level that you have fun with.

Blood~

Party makeup is important when picking a build also. If there someone else stacking Vulnerability I’ll usually go bombs. If you’re the stacker then Grenades is prolly better for the group.

I’ve been running this same build for a while, also in anticipation of the Dec10th update. I’ve gone with Rifle/Healing Turret/Thumper Turret/Grenade Kit/Bomb Kit. My gear is Zerker with 60% Might duration on runes. I run this to stack 12-15 Might and ~18 Vulnerability. I’ve been running some speed runs while being the main Might n Vulnerability stacker, pugs have actually thanked me on a couple occasions…

Thumper Turret has 3x blast finishers which is great but their on a longer cooldown then Rifle Turret and Shield.

Great write up Phineas.

Blood~

That build will probably yield pretty low DPS unfortunatly. If you go ‘tanky’ you’ll prolly suffer low DPS also. I would highly suggest something with 10/25/x/x/10, it will give you a 20% increase to damage and Master of Concecrations. I find that some of the best support we have are Wall of Reflection, Shield of the Avenger and Stand Your Ground. IIRC Save Yourselves and Runes of the Soldier have synergy. Wall of Reflection basically negates damage coming in from projectile attacks and reflects um for damage, best skill we have IMHO. Shield of the Avenger doesn’t reflect but it stops projectiles also. I’d suggest something like 10/30/0/20/10, Sword and Focus have blinds for Vulnerability, along with VoJ. If you have an Ascended Mace already you can use that instead of Sword. Protectors Strike can be used for good DPS if you time it right. Careful of symbols though, you’ll want to blast fire fields for Might and guards usually throw Light fields which could mess up the might stacking, but w/o the symbol Mace’s DPS is lower then Sword’s. That’s where Sword and Scepter are nice, no symbols to over write fire fields.

After you get comfortable with the build start moving more Zerker, I run FotM and all the other dungeons with around 13K HP n Zerker gear, others can run at 11K HP.

For super tanky builds run Hammer with 0/0/30/30/10 Altruistic Healing and Soldiers gear which is terribly low DPS. I found a 25/25/0/20/0 Hammer n Symbol build with Zerker gear to have pretty good DPS and Protection in melee, Knights could work here too but you miss your Crit% Damage.

GL
Blood~

maxinion.8396:

The iDuelist drops somewhat close to you when you finish casting, and actually has a rather large range with no DPS penalty. So you can duck out of the fight for a moment (to heal as well), drop a duelist far from the mob, and jump back in.

Something that people don’t always think about is DPS up-time. Every second you’re away from your target, not attacking it or dodging, is a DPS loss. It can be a significant loss. Not sure what the loss vs gain would be here, losing a phantasm vs placing a phantasm, but it could potentially be a wash. Mind you I haven’t done any figuring or testing with this so I’m just playing devils advocate.

That’s probably why our ranged options are lower DPS in most cases, to balance vs lower up-time melee.

Blood~

As not to distract from the thread.

1. I found the highest damage to be 20/30/0/20/0

2. Full Zerker with Scholar Runes, Sigil of Bloodlust and Sigil of Force or Night

3. Power/Precision/Crit%

To get the most raw DPS you’ll have to swap kits/weapons a lot, can’t simply stay in FT the whole time. Rifle 3 n 5 and EG 4 need to be used on cooldown. Rifle Turret is used for Vulnerability and Surprise Shot. EG4 hits hard, works well with Net Shot and Napalm. The Acid Bomb leap back can be cancelled by the ‘weapon swap’ key. If you don’t twist your kits/weapon your DPS will be noticeably low but doing it this way will bring you up to what I’d consider competitive DSP levels, low end of competitive but you’re there none the less.

Alternatively Runes of Altruism can be used with Med Kit for Fury and Might -or- 2x Runes of Strength, Fire and Hoelbrak each for might duration.

FT is awesome, I just wish they would kick it up like 10%.

Blood~

Captain Swag.5893:

There is no reason this shouldnt be in the game already, and it’s a big middle finger to all engineers, that they’re not.

+1

Rabid temple armor is good for WvW and fits well with Grenades. It’s not good in PvE, conditions alone are not a reliable high dps option. For PvE you’ll want Zerker or Rampagers with Grenades, both do around the same DPS. I wouldn’t recommend Magi or Soldiers either for Grenades in PvE. I run 2 pcs of Soldiers usually but the rest is Zerker or Rampagers.

Blood~

LordByron.8369:

P.p.S. also GS has its applications but if you even discuss the “sacred truth” you shalt be labeled as noob from the anti-GS inquisition…..
Whose sacred god (the mist golem) commanded them to ban the gs from the game.

This is unfortunate. I’ve done a lot of this testing and with a ‘Mantrasm’ 30/30/0/0/10 build the DPS isn’t too far off from Sword/x. GS is 5% to 11% lower depending on how many phantasms are rolling, at least in my test scenario. This doesn’t take into account group might stacks n what not. Sword/X is an optimal choice but IMHO its wrong to view every GS mesmer as a bad player. The % DPS loss with GS gets larger with different builds though.

As far as I have tested /sword vs /pistol is very close dps wise, each having its strengths. If you run 20 in Dueling tree you can switch between them or use both.

Blood~

Stark,

Unfortunately Rifle/Elixirs does pretty low damage, especially without HGH. I’m personally not a fan of HGH because it takes so long to use elixirs and throw them that what you gain from the might stacks you more then lose in DPS down time.

Rifle/SD does quite good damage though, like the one Seras posted. I like to run Rifle Turret, Tool Kit and Personal Battering Ram or sub out PBR for Elixir Gun’s Acid Bomb. The damage is competitive and its and easy/fun build to play. TK gives you a lot of tools, no pun intended. Turret and PBR have low cooldown Toolbelt skills for more Static Discharges. It’s nice burst but its also competitive sustained DPS.

TL;DR If you want Rifle try Rifle/SD, if you want Elixirs try Grenades/HGH.

GL out there,
Blood~

So as not to take away from Rozbuska’s build…

Fire staff elementalist is kittened high dps.

That being said, FT/HGH isn’t that high even with 25 stacks, 10/30/0/20/10 Zerker FT/EG/SD will do more damage. Problem with HGH is you lose a lot of DPS building it up and a lot of stats maintaining long might stacks. Also HGH is personal so your team only gets the might thats built into B.

I’ve been messing with a 30/20/0/20/0 GK/BK build that maintains 12 stacks of might for the team and 20+ stacks of Vulnerability a majority of the time. It 4x blasts with water, fire and smoke fields. It does lower DPS then more selfish zerker builds but will boost all your team members damage up about 35% each which sounds to me like a good trade off. I’ve decided to roll this way because a lot of pugs lack both might and vulnerability stacking so this build will bring both. If you can get your pug to group up and blast the fields you win

Xavi.6591:

The problem with shatter damage these days is because everyone is wearing toughness armour. Add to that protection and they cannot keep up sustained damage.

Even in PvE Shatter does pretty low sustained DPS. From my testing its signifigantly lower then what I would consider average DPS across all classes and zerker builds. Shatter needs some love.

I play both Engi and Mesmer, they’re my two mains, if you can have two…

WvW, I really prefer Engineer. I usually run in cooridnated zergs and grenades are pretty nice there. AoE and utility. Healing Turret is great for zerg play also. I like 30/10/0/0/30 with Rabid/Dire or Rampagers.

PvE.. This one is interesting. Mesmer can push some of the highest damage out there but its situational as you need 3x phantasms on the field and the right build to do so. Mesmer has a lot of tricks also and some good reflects if you trait Focus, which I usually dont.. Engineer on the other hand does average Zerker DPS but it’s by no means bad. You can trait for Vulnerability which adds to the whole groups DPS, and you can stack might also.

If you pug a lot for PvE I’d say Engi with grenades could be a better choice. If you run with good group that stacks vulnerability and might often a Mesmer would prolly do a bit better. Their tools are different and each will contribute, most people don’t honestly know what Engi’s are capable of. Run what you think is most fun for you.

Blood~

Pazu.8320:

Bloodgruve.6038:

30/30/0/0/10 Grenades w/Rampager’s will do the most damage that I’ve personally tested.

It will do even more damage with the coming changes to modified ammunition on Dec. 10 >.<

Shh… that’s supposed to be a secret…

Adding a bit of damage to clones would solve some issues too. A shatter mesmer or phantasm mesmer with 1x phantasm does below average DPS. A phantasm mesmer with 3x phantasms does very good damage. there is a huge discrepancy between the two situations though. If clones could do some damage, like Daishi ‘s 5% to even 15% of your base weapon damage we would probably see a pretty good stabilizing effect. I would even say tack this onto Illusionary Persona or Grandmaster Dueling or make it only available for x seconds after a shatter. Phantasms are in a good place IMHO and don’t need to be buffed really.

Blood~

Shatter needs a significant sustained DPS increase in PvE. Not sure how to accomplish this but it really needs it. I’d love to play shatter in dungeons.

I can see legions of mesmer clones all dancing in step with one another… +1